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diff --git a/old/13567.txt b/old/13567.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..13090ae --- /dev/null +++ b/old/13567.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10470 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Clementina, by A.E.W. Mason + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Clementina + +Author: A.E.W. Mason + +Release Date: October 1, 2004 [EBook #13567] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLEMENTINA *** + + + + +Produced by Josephine Paolucci Joshua Hutchinson and the PG Online +Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: "'SIR,' SAID THE LADY IN ITALIAN, 'I NEED A +POSTILLION.'"--_Page 2_.] + + + + +Clementina + +By A.E.W. Mason + +Author of "The Courtship of Morrice Buckler" "Parson Kelly" etc. + + +Illustrated by Bernard Partridge + +New York +Frederick A. Stokes Company +Publishers + + +1901 + +THIRD EDITION + +UNIVERSITY PRESS JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. + + +THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED +TO +ANDREW LANG, ESQ. +AS A TOKEN OF MUCH +FRIENDSHIP + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + I. A CHANCE MEETING + II. BAD NEWS + III. WOGAN MAKES A PROPOSAL + IV. SHOWS THAT THERE ARE BETTER HIDING-PLACES THAN A WINDOW-CURTAIN + V. SHOWS THAT A DISHONEST LANDLORD SHOULD AVOID WHITE PAINT + VI. WOGAN CONTINUES HIS JOURNEY + VII. WOGAN IS MISTAKEN FOR A MORE NOTABLE MAN + VIII. AT SCHLESTADT + IX. GAYDON MINDS HIS OWN BUSINESS + X. A MONTH OF WAITING + XI. THE PRINCE OF BADEN VISITS CLEMENTINA + XII. THE NIGHT OF THE 27TH. IN THE STREETS OF INNSPRUCK + XIII. THE NIGHT OF THE 27TH. IN CLEMENTINA'S APARTMENTS + XIV. THE ESCAPE + XV. THE FLIGHT TO ITALY: WOGAN'S CITY OF DREAMS + XVI. THE FLIGHT TO ITALY: THE POTENT EFFECTS OF A WATER-JUG + XVII. THE FLIGHT TO ITALY: A GROWING CLOUD + XVIII. WOGAN AND CLEMENTINA CONTINUE THEIR JOURNEY ALONE + XIX. THE ATTACK AT PERI + XX. THE GOD OF THE MACHINE DOES NOT APPEAR + XXI. COMPLICATIONS AT BOLOGNA + XXII. CLEMENTINA TAKES MR. WOGAN TO VISIT THE CAPRARA PALACE + XXIII. WOGAN LEARNS THAT HE HAS MEDDLED + XXIV. MARIA VITTORIA REAPPEARS + XXV. THE LAST + THE EPILOGUE + + + + +CLEMENTINA + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +The landlord, the lady, and Mr. Charles Wogan were all three, it seemed, +in luck's way that September morning of the year 1719. Wogan was not +surprised, his luck for the moment was altogether in, so that even when +his horse stumbled and went lame at a desolate part of the road from +Florence to Bologna, he had no doubt but that somehow fortune would +serve him. His horse stepped gingerly on for a few yards, stopped, and +looked round at his master. Wogan and his horse were on the best of +terms. "Is it so bad as that?" said he, and dismounting he gently felt +the strained leg. Then he took the bridle in his hand and walked +forward, whistling as he walked. + +Yet the place and the hour were most unlikely to give him succour. It +was early morning, and he walked across an empty basin of the hills. The +sun was not visible, though the upper air was golden and the green peaks +of the hills rosy. The basin itself was filled with a broad uncoloured +light, and lay naked to it and extraordinarily still. There were as yet +no shadows; the road rose and dipped across low ridges of turf, a +ribbon of dead and unillumined white; and the grass at any distance from +the road had the darkness of peat. He led his horse forward for perhaps +a mile, and then turning a corner by a knot of trees came unexpectedly +upon a wayside inn. In front of the inn stood a travelling carriage with +its team of horses. The backs of the horses smoked, and the candles of +the lamps were still burning in the broad daylight. Mr. Wogan quickened +his pace. He would beg a seat on the box to the next posting stage. +Fortune had served him. As he came near he heard from the interior of +the inn a woman's voice, not unmusical so much as shrill with +impatience, which perpetually ordered and protested. As he came nearer +he heard a man's voice obsequiously answering the protests, and as the +sound of his footsteps rang in front of the inn both voices immediately +stopped. The door was flung hastily open, and the landlord and the lady +ran out onto the road. + +"Sir," said the lady in Italian, "I need a postillion." + +To Wogan's thinking she needed much more than a postillion. She needed +certainly a retinue of servants. He was not quite sure that she did not +need a nurse, for she was a creature of an exquisite fragility, with the +pouting face of a child, and the childishness was exaggerated by a great +muslin bow she wore at her throat. Her pale hair, where it showed +beneath her hood, was fine as silk and as glossy; her eyes had the +colour of an Italian sky at noon, and her cheeks the delicate tinge of +a carnation. The many laces and ribbons, knotted about her dress in a +manner most mysterious to Wogan, added to her gossamer appearance; and, +in a word, she seemed to him something too flowerlike for the world's +rough usage. + +"I must have a postillion," she continued. + +"Presently, madam," said the landlord, smiling with all a Tuscan +peasant's desire to please. "In a minute. In less than a minute." + +He looked complacently about him as though at any moment now a crop of +postillions might be expected to flower by the roadside. The lady turned +from him with a stamp of the foot and saw that Wogan was curiously +regarding her carriage. A boy stood at the horses' heads, but his dress +and sleepy face showed that he had not been half an hour out of bed, and +there was no one else. Wogan was wondering how in the world she had +travelled as far as this inn. The lady explained. + +"The postillion who drove me from Florence was drunk--oh, but drunk! He +rolled off his horse just here, opposite the door. See, I beat him," and +she raised the beribboned handle of a toy-like cane. "But it was no use. +I broke my cane over his back, but he would not get up. He crawled into +the passage where he lies." + +Wogan had some ado not to smile. Neither the cane nor the hand which +wielded it would be likely to interfere even with a sober man's +slumbers. + +"And I must reach Bologna to-day," she cried in an extreme agitation. +"It is of the last importance." + +"Fortune is kind to us both, madam," said Wogan, with a bow. "My horse +is lamed, as you see. I will be your charioteer, for I too am in a +desperate hurry to reach Bologna." + +Immediately the lady drew back. + +"Oh!" she said with a start, looking at Wogan. + +Wogan looked at her. + +"Ah!" said he, thoughtfully. + +They eyed each other for a moment, each silently speculating what the +other was doing alone at this hour and in such a haste to reach Bologna. + +"You are English?" she said with a great deal of unconcern, and she +asked in English. That _she_ was English, Wogan already knew from her +accent. His Italian, however, was more than passable, and he was a wary +man by nature as well as by some ten years' training in a service where +wariness was the first need, though it was seldom acquired. He could +have answered "No" quite truthfully, being Irish. He preferred to answer +her in Italian as though he had not understood. + +"I beg your pardon. Yes, I will drive you to Bologna if the landlord +will swear to look after my horse." And he was very precise in his +directions. + +The landlord swore very readily. His anxiety to be rid of his vociferous +guest and to get back to bed was extreme. Wogan climbed into the +postillion's saddle, describing the while such remedies as he desired +to be applied to the sprained leg. + +"The horse is a favourite?" asked the lady. + +"Madam," said Wogan, with a laugh, "I would not lose that horse for all +the world, for the woman I shall marry will ride on it into my city of +dreams." + +The lady stared, as she well might. She hesitated with her foot upon the +step. + +"Is he sober?" she asked of the landlord. + +"Madam," said the landlord, unabashed, "in this district he is nicknamed +the water drinker." + +"You know him, then? He is Italian?" + +"He is more. He is of Tuscany." + +The landlord had never seen Wogan in his life before, but the lady +seemed to wish some assurance on the point, so he gave it. He shut the +carriage door, and Wogan cracked his whip. + +The postillion's desires were of a piece with the lady's. They raced +across the valley, and as they climbed the slope beyond, the sun came +over the crests. One moment the dew upon the grass was like raindrops, +the next it shone like polished jewels. The postillion shouted a welcome +to the sun, and the lady proceeded to breakfast in her carriage. Wogan +had to snatch a meal as best he could while the horses were changed at +the posting stage. The lady would not wait, and Wogan for his part was +used to a light fare. He drove into Bologna that afternoon. + +The lady put her head from the window and called out the name of a +street. Her postillion, however, paid no heed: he seemed suddenly to +have grown deaf; he whipped up his horses, shouted encouragements to +them and warnings to the pedestrians on the roads. The carriage rocked +round corners and bounced over the uneven stones. Wogan had clean +forgotten the fragility of the traveller within. He saw men going busily +about, talking in groups and standing alone, and all with consternation +upon their faces. The quiet streets were alive with them. Something had +happened that day in Bologna,--some catastrophe. Or news had come that +day,--bad news. Wogan did not stop to inquire. He drove at a gallop +straight to a long white house which fronted the street. The green +latticed shutters were closed against the sun, but there were servants +about the doorway, and in their aspect, too, there was something of +disorder. Wogan called to one of them, jumped down from his saddle, and +ran through the open doorway into a great hall with frescoed walls all +ruined by neglect. At the back of the hall a marble staircase, guarded +by a pair of marble lions, ran up to a landing and divided. Wogan set +foot on the staircase and heard an exclamation of surprise. He looked +up. A burly, good-humoured man in the gay embroideries of a courtier was +descending towards him. + +"You?" cried the courtier. "Already?" and then laughed. He was the only +man whom Wogan had seen laugh since he drove into Bologna, and he drew a +great breath of hope. + +"Then nothing has happened, Whittington? There is no bad news?" + +"There is news so bad, my friend, that you might have jogged here on a +mule and still have lost no time. Your hurry is clean wasted," answered +Whittington. + +Wogan ran past him up the stairs, and so left the hall and the open +doorway clear. Whittington looked now straight through the doorway, and +saw the carriage and the lady on the point of stepping down onto the +kerb. His face assumed a look of extreme surprise. Then he glanced up +the staircase after Wogan and laughed as though the conjunction of the +lady and Mr. Wogan was a rare piece of amusement. Mr. Wogan did not hear +the laugh, but the lady did. She raised her head, and at the same moment +the courtier came across the hall to meet her. As soon as he had come +close, "Harry," said she, and gave him her hand. + +He bent over it and kissed it, and there was more than courtesy in the +warmth of the kiss. + +"But I'm glad you've come. I did not look for you for another week," he +said in a low voice. He did not, however, offer to help her to alight. + +"This is your lodging?" she asked. + +"No," said he, "the King's;" and the woman shrank suddenly back amongst +her cushions. In a moment, however, her face was again at the door. + +"Then who was he,--my postillion?" + +"Your postillion?" asked Whittington, glancing at the servant who held +the horses. + +"Yes, the tall man who looked as if he should have been a scholar and +had twisted himself all awry into a soldier. You must have passed him in +the hall." + +Whittington stared at her. Then he burst again into a laugh. + +"Your postillion, was he? That's the oddest thing," and he lowered his +voice. "Your postillion was Mr. Charles Wogan, who comes from Rome +post-haste with the Pope's procuration for the marriage. You have helped +him on his way, it seems. Here's a good beginning, to be sure." + +The lady uttered a little cry of anger, and her face hardened out of all +its softness. She clenched her fists viciously, and her blue eyes grew +cold and dangerous as steel. At this moment she hardly looked the +delicate flower she had appeared to Wogan's fancy. + +"But you need not blame yourself," said Whittington, and he lowered his +head to a level with hers. "All the procurations in Christendom will not +marry James Stuart to Clementina Sobieski." + +"She has not come, then?" + +"No, nor will she come. There is news to-day. Lean back from the window, +and I will tell you. She has been arrested at Innspruck." + +The lady could not repress a crow of delight. + +"Hush," said Whittington. Then he withdrew his head and resumed in his +ordinary voice, "I have hired a house for your Ladyship, which I trust +will be found convenient. My servant will drive you thither." + +He summoned his servant from the group of footmen about the entrance, +gave him his orders, bowed to the ground, and twisting his cane +sauntered idly down the street. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Wogan mounted the stairs, not daring to speculate upon the nature of the +bad news. But his face was pale beneath its sunburn, and his hand +trembled on the balustrade; for he knew--in his heart he knew. There +could be only one piece of news which would make his haste or tardiness +matters of no account. + +Both branches of the stairs ran up to a common landing, and in the wall +facing him, midway between the two stairheads, was a great door of tulip +wood. An usher stood by the door, and at Wogan's approach opened it. +Wogan, however, signed to him to be silent. He wished to hear, not to +speak, and so he slipped into the room unannounced. The door was closed +silently behind him, and at once he was surprised by the remarkable +silence, almost a cessation of life it seemed, in a room which was quite +full. Wherever the broad bars of sunshine fell, as they slanted dusty +with motes through the open lattices of the shutters, they striped a +woman's dress or a man's velvet coat. Yet if anyone shuffled a foot or +allowed a petticoat to rustle, that person glanced on each side +guiltily. A group of people were gathered in front of the doorway. Their +backs were towards Wogan, and they were looking towards the centre of +the room. Wogan raised himself on his toes and looked that way too. +Having looked he sank down again, aware at once that he had travelled of +late a long way in a little time, and that he was intolerably tired. For +that one glance was enough to deprive him of his last possibility of +doubt. He had seen the Chevalier de St. George, his King, sitting apart +in a little open space, and over against him a short squarish man, dusty +as Wogan himself, who stood and sullenly waited. It was Sir John Hay, +the man who had been sent to fetch the Princess Clementina privately to +Bologna, and here he now was back at Bologna and alone. + +Wogan had counted much upon this marriage, more indeed than any of his +comrades. It was to be the first step of the pedestal in the building up +of a throne. It was to establish in Europe a party for James Stuart as +strong as the party of Hanover. But so much was known to everyone in +that room; to Wogan the marriage meant more. For even while he found +himself muttering over and over with dry lips, as white and exhausted he +leaned against the door, Clementina's qualifications,--"Daughter of the +King of Poland, cousin to the Emperor and to the King of Portugal, niece +to the Electors of Treves, Bavaria, and Palatine,"--the image of the +girl herself rose up before his eyes and struck her titles from his +thoughts. She was the chosen woman, chosen by him out of all Europe--and +lost by John Hay! + +He remembered very clearly at that moment his first meeting with her. +He had travelled from court to court in search of the fitting wife, and +had come at last to the palace at Ohlau in Silesia. It was in the dusk +of the evening, and as he was ushered into the great stone hall, hung +about and carpeted with barbaric skins, he had seen standing by the +blazing wood fire in the huge chimney a girl in a riding dress. She +raised her head, and the firelight struck upwards on her face, adding a +warmth to its bright colours and a dancing light to the depths of her +dark eyes. Her hair was drawn backwards from her forehead, and the +frank, sweet face revealed to him from the broad forehead to the rounded +chin told him that here was one who joined to a royal dignity the simple +nature of a peasant girl who works in the fields and knows more of +animals than of mankind. Wogan was back again in that stone hall when +the voice of the Chevalier with its strong French accent broke in upon +his vision. + +"Well, we will hear the story. Well, you left Ohlau with the Princess +and her mother and a mile-long train of servants in spite of my commands +of secrecy." + +There was more anger and less despondency than was often heard in his +voice. Wogan raised himself again on tiptoes and noticed that the +Chevalier's face was flushed and his eyes bright with wrath. + +"Sir," pleaded Hay, "the Princess's mother would not abate a man." + +"Well, you reached Ratisbon. And there?" + +"There the English minister came forward from the town to flout us with +an address of welcome in which he used not our incognitos but our true +names." + +"From Ratisbon then no doubt you hurried? Since you were discovered, you +shed your retinue and hurried?" + +"Sir, we hurried--to Augsburg," faltered Hay. He stopped, and then in a +burst of desperation he said, "At Augsburg we stayed eight days." + +"Eight days?" + +There was a stir throughout the room; a murmur began and ceased. Wogan +wiped his forehead and crushed his handkerchief into a hard ball in his +palm. It seemed to him that here in this room he could see the Princess +Clementina's face flushed with the humiliation of that loitering. + +"And why eight days in Augsburg?" + +"The Princess's mother would have her jewels reset. Augsburg is famous +for its jewellers," stammered Hay. + +The murmur rose again; it became almost a cry of stupefaction. The +Chevalier sprang from his chair. "Her jewels reset!" he said. He +repeated the words in bewilderment. "Her jewels reset!" Then he dropped +again into his seat. + +"I lose a wife, gentlemen, and very likely a kingdom too, so that a lady +may have her jewels reset at Augsburg, where, to be sure, there are +famous jewellers." + +His glance, wandering in a dazed way about the room, settled again on +Hay. He stamped his foot on the ground in a feverish irritation. + +"And those eight days gave just the time for a courier from the Emperor +at Vienna to pass you on the road and not press his horse. One should be +glad of that. It would have been a pity had the courier killed his +horse. Oh, I can fashion the rest of the story for myself. You trailed +on to Innspruck, where the Governor marched out with a troop and herded +you in. They let _you_ go, however. No doubt they bade you hurry back to +me." + +"Sir, I did hurry," said Hay, who was now in a pitiable confusion. "I +travelled hither without rest." + +The anger waned in the Chevalier's eyes as he heard the plea, and a +great dejection crept over his face. + +"Yes, you would do that," said he. "That would be the time for you to +hurry with a pigeon's swiftness so that your King might taste his bitter +news not a minute later than need be. And what said she upon her +arrest?" + +"The Princess's mother?" asked Hay, barely aware of what he said. + +"No. Her Highness, the Princess Clementina. What said she?" + +"Sir, she covered her face with her hands for perhaps the space of a +minute. Then she leaned forward to the Governor, who stood by her +carriage, and cried, 'Shut four walls about me quick! I could sink into +the earth for shame.'" + +Wogan in those words heard her voice as clearly as he saw her face and +the dry lips between which the voice passed. He had it in his heart to +cry aloud, to send the words ringing through that hushed room, "She +would have tramped here barefoot had she had one guide with a spirit to +match hers." For a moment he almost fancied that he had spoken them, and +that he heard the echo of his voice vibrating down to silence. But he +had not, and as he realised that he had not, a new thought occurred to +him. No one had remarked his entrance into the room. The group in front +still stood with their backs towards him. Since his entrance no one had +remarked his presence. At once he turned and opened the door so gently +that there was not so much as a click of the latch. He opened it just +wide enough for himself to slip through, and he closed it behind him +with the same caution. On the landing there was only the usher. Wogan +looked over the balustrade; there was no one in the hall below. + +"You can keep a silent tongue," he said to the usher. "There's profit in +it;" and Wogan put his hand into his pocket. "You have not seen me if +any ask." + +"Sir," said the man, "any bright object disturbs my vision." + +"You can see a crown, though," said Wogan. + +"Through a breeches pocket. But if I held it in my hand--" + +"It would dazzle you." + +"So much that I should be blind to the giver." + +The crown was offered and taken. + +Wogan went quietly down the stairs into the hall. There were a few +lackeys at the door, but they would not concern themselves at all +because Mr. Wogan had returned to Bologna. He looked carefully out into +the street, chose a moment when it was empty, and hurried across it. He +dived into the first dark alley that he came to, and following the wynds +and byways of the town made his way quickly to his lodging. He had the +key to his door in his pocket, and he now kept it ready in his hand. +From the shelter of a corner he watched again till the road was clear; +he even examined the windows of the neighbouring houses lest somewhere a +pair of eyes might happen to be alert. Then he made a run for his door, +opened it without noise, and crept secretly as a thief up the stairs to +his rooms, where he had the good fortune to find his servant. Wogan had +no need to sign to him to be silent. The man was a veteran corporal of +French Guards who after many seasons of campaigning in Spain and the Low +Countries had now for five years served Mr. Wogan. He looked at his +master and without a word went off to make his bed. + +Wogan sat down and went carefully over in his mind every minute of the +time since he had entered Bologna. No one had noticed him when he rode +in as the lady's postillion,--no one. He was sure of that. The lady +herself did not know him from Adam, and fancied him an Italian into the +bargain--of that, too, he had no doubt. The handful of lackeys at the +door of the King's house need not be taken into account. They might +gossip among themselves, but Wogan's appearances and disappearances were +so ordinary a matter, even that was unlikely. The usher's silence he had +already secured. There was only one acquaintance who had met and spoken +with him, and that by the best of good fortune was Harry +Whittington,--the idler who took his banishment and his King's +misfortunes with an equally light heart, and gave never a thought at all +to anything weightier than a gamecock. + +Wogan's spirits revived. He had not yet come to the end of his luck. He +sat down and wrote a short letter and sealed it up. + +"Marnier," he called out in a low voice, and his servant came from the +adjoining room, "take this to Mr. Edgar, the King's secretary, as soon +as it grows dusk. Have a care that no one sees you deliver it. Lock the +parlour door when you go, and take the key. I am not yet back from +Rome." With that Wogan remembered that he had not slept for forty-eight +hours. Within two minutes he was between the sheets; within five he was +asleep. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Wogan waked up in the dark and was seized with a fear that he had slept +too long. He jumped out of bed and pushed open the door of his parlour. +There was a lighted lamp in the room, and Marnier was quietly laying his +master's supper. + +"At what hour?" asked Wogan. + +"Ten o'clock, monsieur, at the little postern in the garden wall." + +"And the time now?" + +"Nine." + +Wogan dressed with some ceremony, supped, and at eight minutes to ten +slipped down the stairs and out of doors. He had crushed his hat down +upon his forehead and he carried his handkerchief at his face. But the +streets were dark and few people were abroad. At a little distance to +his left he saw above the housetops a glow of light in the air which +marked the Opera-House. Wogan avoided it; he kept again to the alleys +and emerged before the Chevalier's lodging. This he passed, but a +hundred yards farther on he turned down a side street and doubled back +upon his steps along a little byway between small houses. The line of +houses, however, at one point was broken by a garden wall. Under this +wall Wogan waited until a clock struck ten, and while the clock was +still striking he heard on the other side of the wall the brushing of +footsteps amongst leaves and grass. Wogan tapped gently on a little door +in the wall. It was opened no less gently, and Edgar the secretary +admitted him, led him across the garden and up a narrow flight of stairs +into a small lighted cabinet. Two men were waiting in that room. One of +them wore the scarlet robe, an old man with white hair and a broad +bucolic face, whom Wogan knew for the Pope's Legate, Cardinal Origo. The +slender figure of the other, clad all in black but for the blue ribbon +of the Garter across his breast, brought Wogan to his knee. + +Wogan held out the Pope's procuration to the Chevalier, who took it and +devoutly kissed the signature. Then he gave his hand to Wogan with a +smile of friendliness. + +"You have outsped your time by two days, Mr. Wogan. That is unwise, +since it may lead us to expect again the impossible of you. But here, +alas, your speed for once brings us no profit. You have heard, no doubt. +Her Highness the Princess Clementina is held at Innspruck in prison." + +Wogan rose to his feet. + +"Prisons, sir," he said quietly, "have been broken before to-day. I +myself was once put to that necessity." The words took the Chevalier +completely by surprise. He leaned back in his chair and stared at Wogan. + +"An army could not rescue her," he said. + +"No, but one man might." + +"You?" he exclaimed. He pressed down the shade of the lamp to throw the +light fully upon Wogan's face. "It is impossible!" + +"Then I beg your Majesty to expect the impossible again." + +The Chevalier drew his hand across his eyes and stared afresh at Wogan. +The audacity of the exploit and the imperturbable manner of its proposal +caught his breath away. He rose from his chair and took a turn or two +across the room. + +Wogan watched his every gesture. It would be difficult he knew to wring +the permission he needed from his dejected master, and his unruffled +demeanour was a calculated means of persuasion. An air of confidence was +the first requisite. In reality, however, Wogan was not troubled at this +moment by any thought of failure. It was not that he had any plan in his +head; but he was fired with a conviction that somehow this chosen woman +was not to be wasted, that some day, released by some means in spite of +all the pressure English Ministers could bring upon the Emperor, she +would come riding into Bologna. + +The Chevalier paused in his walk and looked towards the Cardinal. + +"What does your Eminence say?" + +"That to the old the impulsiveness of youth is eternally charming," said +the Cardinal, with a foppish delicacy of speaking in an odd contrast to +his person. + +Mr. Wogan understood that he had a second antagonist. + +"I am not a youth, your Eminence," he exclaimed with all the indignation +of twenty-seven years. "I am a man." + +"But an Irishman, and that spells youth. You write poetry too, I +believe, Mr. Wogan. It is a heady practice." + +Wogan made no answer, though the words stung. An argument with the +Cardinal would be sure to ruin his chance of obtaining the Chevalier's +consent. He merely bowed to the Cardinal and waited for the Chevalier to +speak. + +"Look you, Mr. Wogan; while the Emperor's at war with Spain, while +England's fleet could strip him of Sicily, he's England's henchman. He +dare not let the Princess go. We know it. General Heister, the Governor +of Innspruck, is under pain of death to hold her safe." + +"But, sir, would the world stop if General Heister died?" + +"A German scaffold if you fail." + +"In the matter of scaffolds I have no leaning towards any one +nationality." + +The Cardinal smiled. He liked a man of spirit, though he might think him +absurd. The Chevalier resumed his restless pacing to and fro. + +"It is impossible." + +But he seemed to utter the phrase with less decision this second time. +Wogan pressed his advantage at the expense of his modesty. + +"Sir, will you allow me to tell you a story,--a story of an impossible +escape from Newgate in the heart of London by a man in fetters? There +were nine grenadiers with loaded muskets standing over him. There were +two courtyards to cross, two walls to climb, and beyond the walls the +unfriendly streets. The man hoodwinked his sentries, climbed his two +walls, crossed the unfriendly streets, and took refuge in a cellar, +where he was discovered. From the cellar in broad daylight he fought his +way to the roofs, and on the roofs he played such a game of +hide-and-seek among the chimney-tops--" Wogan broke off from his story +with a clear thrill of laughter; it was a laugh of enjoyment at a +pleasing recollection. Then he suddenly flung himself down on his knee +at the feet of his sovereign. "Give me leave, your Majesty," he cried +passionately. "Let me go upon this errand. If I fail, if the scaffold's +dressed for me, why where's the harm? Your Majesty loses one servant out +of his many. Whereas, if I win--" and he drew a long breath. "Aye, and I +shall win! There's the Princess, too, a prisoner. Sir, she has ventured +much. I beg you give me leave." + +The Chevalier laid his hand gently upon Wogan's shoulder, but he did not +assent. He looked again doubtfully to the Cardinal, who said with his +pleasant smile, "I will wager Mr. Wogan a box at the Opera on the first +night that he returns, that he will return empty-handed." + +Wogan rose to his feet and replied good-humouredly, "It's a wager I +take the more readily in that your Eminence cannot win, though you may +lose. For if I return empty-handed, upon my honour I'll not return at +all." + +The Cardinal condescended to laugh. Mr. Wogan laughed too. He had good +reason, for here was his Eminence in a kindly temper and the Chevalier +warming out of his melancholy. And, indeed, while he was still laughing +the Chevalier caught him by the arm as a friend might do, and in an +outburst of confidence, very rare with him, he said, "I would that I +could laugh so. You and Whittington, I do envy you. An honest laugh, +there's the purge for melancholy. But I cannot compass it," and he +turned away. + +"Sure, sir, you'll put us all to shame when I bring her Royal Highness +out of Innspruck." + +"Oh, that!" said the Chevalier, as though for the moment he had +forgotten. "It is impossible," and the phrase was spoken now in an +accent of hesitation. Moreover, he sat down at a table, and drawing a +sheet of paper written over with memoranda, he began to read aloud with +a glance towards Wogan at the end of each sentence. + +"The house stands in the _faubourgs_ of Innspruck. There is an avenue of +trees in front of the house; on the opposite side of the avenue there is +a tavern with the sign of 'The White Chamois.'" + +Wogan committed the words to memory. + +"The Princess and her mother," continued the Chevalier, "are imprisoned +in the east side of the house." + +"And how guarded, sir?" asked Wogan. + +The Chevalier read again from his paper. + +"A sentry at each door, a third beneath the prisoners' windows. They +keep watch night and day. Besides, twice a day the magistrate visits the +house." + +"At what hours?" + +"At ten in the morning. The same hour at night." + +"And on each visit the magistrate sees the Princess?" + +"Yes, though she lies abed." + +Wogan stroked his chin. The Cardinal regarded him quizzically. + +"I trust, Mr. Wogan, that we shall hear Farini. There is talk of his +coming to Bologna." + +Wogan did not answer. He was silent; he saw the three sentinels standing +watchfully about the house; he heard them calling "All's well" each to +the other. Then he asked, "Has the Princess her own servants to attend +her?" + +"Only M. Chateaudoux, her chamberlain." + +"Ah!" + +Wogan leaned forward with a question on his tongue he hardly dared to +ask. So much hung upon the answer. + +"And M. Chateaudoux is allowed to come and go?" + +"In the daylight." + +Wogan turned to the Cardinal. "The box will be the best box in the +house," Wogan suggested. + +"Oh, sir," replied the Cardinal, "on the first tier, to be sure." + +Wogan turned back to the Chevalier. + +"All that I need now is a letter from your Majesty to the King of Poland +and a few rascally guineas. I can leave Bologna before a soul's astir in +the morning. No one but Whittington saw me to-day, and a word will keep +him silent. There will be secrecy--" but the Chevalier suddenly cut him +short. + +"No," said he, bringing the palm of his hand down upon the table. +"Here's a blow that we must bend to! It's a dream, this plan of yours." + +"But a dream I'll dream so hard, sir, that I'll dream it true," cried +Wogan, in despair. + +"No, no," said the Chevalier. "We'll talk no more of it. There's God's +will evident in this arrest, and we must bend to it;" and at once Wogan +remembered his one crowning argument. It was so familiar to his +thoughts, it had lain so close at his heart, that he had left it +unspoken, taking it as it were for granted that others were as familiar +with it as he. + +"Sir," said he, eagerly, "I have never told you, but the Princess +Clementina when a child amongst her playmates had a favourite game. They +called it kings and queens. And in that game the Princess was always +chosen Queen of England." + +The Chevalier started. + +"Is that so?" and he gazed into Wogan's eyes, making sure that he spoke +the truth. + +"In very truth it is," and the two men stood looking each at the other +and quite silent. + +It was the truth, a mere coincidence if you will, but to both these men +omens and auguries were the gravest matters. + +"There indeed is God's finger pointing," cried Wogan. "Sir, give me +leave to follow it." + +The Chevalier still stood looking at him in silence. Then he said +suddenly, "Go, then, and God speed you! You are a gallant gentleman." + +He sat down thereupon and wrote a letter to the King of Poland, asking +him to entrust the rescue of his daughter into Wogan's hands. This +letter Wogan took and money for his journey. + +"You will have preparations to make," said the Chevalier. "I will not +keep you. You have horses?" + +Mr. Wogan had two in a stable at Bologna. "But," he added, "there is a +horse I left this morning six miles this side of Fiesole, a black horse, +and I would not lose it." + +"Nor shall you," said the Chevalier. + +Wogan crept back to his lodging as cautiously as he had left it. There +was no light in any window but in his own, where his servant, Marnier, +awaited him. Wogan opened the door softly and found the porter asleep in +his chair. He stole upstairs and made his preparations. These, however, +were of the simplest kind, and consisted of half-a-dozen orders to +Marnier and the getting into bed. In the morning he woke before daybreak +and found Marnier already up. They went silently out of the house as +the dawn was breaking. Marnier had the key to the stables, and they +saddled the two horses and rode through the blind and silent streets +with their faces muffled in their cloaks. + +They met no one, however, until they were come to the outskirts of the +town. But then as they passed the mouth of an alley a man came suddenly +out and as suddenly drew back. The morning was chill, and the man was +closely wrapped. + +Wogan could not distinguish his face or person, and looking down the +alley he saw at the end of it only a garden wall, and over the top of +the wall a thicket of trees and the chimney-tops of a low house +embosomed amongst them. He rode on, secure in the secrecy of his +desperate adventure. But that same morning Mr. Whittington paid a visit +to Wogan's lodging and asked to be admitted. He was told that Mr. Wogan +had not yet returned to Bologna. + +"So, indeed, I thought," said he; and he sauntered carelessly along, not +to his own house, but to one smaller, situated at the bottom of a +_cul-de-sac_ and secluded amongst trees. At the door he asked whether +her Ladyship was yet visible, and was at once shown into a room with +long windows which stood open to the garden. Her Ladyship lay upon a +sofa sipping her coffee and teasing a spaniel with the toe of her +slipper. + +"You are early," she said with some surprise. + +"And yet no earlier than your Ladyship," said Whittington. + +"I have to make my obeisance to my King," said she, stifling a yawn. +"Could one, I ask you, sleep on so important a day?" + +Mr. Whittington laughed genially. Then he opened the door and glanced +along the passage. When he turned back into the room her Ladyship had +kicked the spaniel from the sofa and was sitting bolt upright with all +her languor gone. + +"Well?" she asked quickly. + +Whittington took a seat on the sofa by her side. + +"Charles Wogan left Bologna at daybreak. Moreover, I have had a message +from the Chevalier bidding me not to mention that I saw him in Bologna +yesterday. One could hazard a guess at the goal of so secret a journey." + +"Ohlau!" exclaimed the lady, in a whisper. Then she nestled back upon +the sofa and bit the fragment of lace she called her handkerchief. + +"So there's an end of Mr. Wogan," she said pleasantly. + +Whittington made no answer. + +"For there's no chance that he'll succeed," she continued with a touch +of anxiety in her voice. + +Whittington neither agreed nor contradicted. He asked a question +instead. + +"What is the sharpest spur a man can know? What is it that gives a man +audacity to attempt and wit to accomplish the impossible?" + +The lady smiled. + +"The poets tell us love," said she, demurely. + +Whittington nodded his head. + +"Wogan speaks very warmly of the Princess Clementina." + +Her Ladyship's red lips lost their curve. Her eyes became thoughtful, +apprehensive. + +"I wonder," she said slowly. + +"Yes, I too wonder," said Whittington. + +Outside the branches of the trees rustled in the wind and flung shadows, +swift as ripples, across the sunlit grass. But within the little room +there was a long silence. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +M. Chateaudoux, the chamberlain, was a little portly person with a +round, red face like a cherub's. He was a creature of the house, one +that walked with delicate steps, a conductor of ceremonies, an expert in +the subtleties of etiquette; and once he held his wand of office in his +hand, there was nowhere to be found a being so precise and +consequential. But out of doors he had the timidity of a cat. He lived, +however, by rule and rote, and since it had always been his habit to +take the air between three and four of the afternoon, he was to be seen +between those hours at Innspruck on any fine day mincing along the +avenue of trees before the villa in which his mistress was held +prisoner. + +On one afternoon during the month of October he passed a hawker, who, +tired with his day's tramp, was resting on a bench in the avenue, and +who carried upon his arm a half-empty basket of cheap wares. The man was +ragged; his toes were thrusting through his shoes; it was evident that +he wore no linen, and a week's growth of beard dirtily stubbled his +chin,--in a word, he was a man from whom M. Chateaudoux's prim soul +positively shrank. M. Chateaudoux went quickly by, fearing to be +pestered for alms. The hawker, however, remained seated upon the bench, +drawing idle patterns upon the gravel with a hazel stick stolen from a +hedgerow. + +The next afternoon the hawker was in the avenue again, only this time on +a bench at the opposite end; and again he paid no heed to M. +Chateaudoux, but sat moodily scraping the gravel with his stick. + +On the third afternoon M. Chateaudoux found the hawker seated in the +middle of the avenue and over against the door of the guarded villa. M. +Chateaudoux, when his timidity slept, was capable of good nature. There +was a soldier with a loaded musket in full view. The hawker, besides, +had not pestered him. He determined to buy some small thing,--a mirror, +perhaps, which was always useful,--and he approached the hawker, who for +his part wearily flicked the gravel with his stick and drew a curve here +and a line there until, as M. Chateaudoux stopped before the bench, +there lay sketched at his feet the rude semblance of a crown. The stick +swept over it the next instant and left the gravel smooth. + +But M. Chateaudoux had seen, and his heart fluttered and sank. For here +were plots, possibly dangers, most certainly trepidations. He turned his +back as though he had seen nothing, and constraining himself to a slow +pace walked towards the door of the villa. But the hawker was now at his +side, whining in execrable German and a strong French accent the +remarkable value of his wares. There were samplers most exquisitely +worked, jewels for the most noble gentleman's honoured sweetheart, and +purses which emperors would give a deal to buy. Chateaudoux was urged to +take notice that emperors would give sums to lay a hand on the hawker's +purses. + +M. Chateaudoux pretended not to hear. + +"I want nothing," he said, "nothing in the world;" and he repeated the +statement in order to drown the other's voice. + +"A purse, good gentleman," persisted the hawker, and he dangled one +before Chateaudoux's eyes. Not for anything would Chateaudoux take that +purse. + +"Go away," he cried; "I have a sufficiency of purses, and I will not be +plagued by you." + +They were now at the steps of the villa, and the sentry, lifting the +butt of his musket, roughly thrust the hawker back. + +"What have you there? Bring your basket here," said he; and to +Chateaudoux's consternation the hawker immediately offered the purse to +the sentinel. + +"It is only the poor who have kind hearts," he said; "here's the proper +purse for a soldier. It is so hard to get the money out that a man is +saved an ocean of drink." + +The hawker's readiness destroyed any suspicions the sentinel may have +felt. + +"Go away," he said, "quick!" + +"You will buy the purse?" + +The sentinel raised his musket again. + +"Then the kind gentleman will," said the hawker, and he thrust the purse +into M. Chateaudoux's reluctant hand. Chateaudoux could feel within the +purse a folded paper. He was committed now without a doubt, and in an +extreme alarm he flung a coin into the roadway and got him into the +house. The sentinel carelessly dropped the butt of his musket on the +coin. + +"Go," said he, and with a sudden kick he lifted the hawker half across +the road. The hawker happened to be Charles Wogan, who took a little +matter like that with the necessary philosophy. He picked himself up and +limped off. + +Now the next day a remarkable thing happened. M. Chateaudoux swerved +from the regularity of his habits. He walked along the avenue, it is +true; but at the end of it he tripped down a street and turned out of +that into another which brought him to the arcades. He did not appear to +enjoy his walk; indeed, any hurrying footsteps behind startled him +exceedingly and made his face turn white and red, and his body hot and +cold. However, he proceeded along the arcades to the cathedral, which he +entered; and just as the clock struck half-past three, in a dark corner +opposite to the third of the great statues he drew his handkerchief from +his pocket. + +The handkerchief flipped out a letter which fell onto the ground. In the +gloom it was barely visible; and M. Chateaudoux walked on, apparently +unconscious of his loss. But a comfortable citizen in a snuff-coloured +suit picked it up and walked straight out of the cathedral to the Golden +Fleece Inn in the Hochstrasse, where he lodged. He went up into his room +and examined the letter. It was superscribed "To M. Chateaudoux," and +the seal was broken. Nevertheless, the finder did not scruple to read +it. It was a love-letter to the little gentleman from one Friederika. + +"I am heart-broken," wrote Friederika, "but my fidelity to my +Chateaudoux has not faltered, nor will not, whatever I may be called +upon to endure. I cannot, however, be so undutiful as to accept my +Chateaudoux's addresses without my father's consent; and my mother, who +is of the same mind with me, insists that even with that consent a +runaway marriage is not to be thought of unless my Chateaudoux can +provide me with a suitable woman for an attendant." + +These conditions fulfilled, Friederika was willing to follow her +Chateaudoux to the world's end. The comfortable citizen in the +snuff-coloured suit sat for some while over that letter with a strange +light upon his face and a smile of great happiness. The comfortable +citizen was Charles Wogan, and he could dissociate the obstructions of +the mother from the willingness of the girl. + +The October evening wove its veils from the mountain crests across the +valleys; the sun and the daylight had gone from the room before Wogan +tore that letter up and wrote another to the Chevalier at Bologna, +telling him that the Princess Clementina would venture herself gladly if +he could secure the consent of Prince Sobieski, her father. And the next +morning he drove out in a carriage towards Ohlau in Silesia. + +It was as the Chevalier Warner that he had first journeyed thither to +solicit for his King the Princess Clementina's hand. Consequently he +used the name again. Winter came upon him as he went; the snow gathered +thick upon the hills and crept down into the valleys, encumbering his +path. The cold nipped his bones; he drove beneath great clouds and +through a stinging air, but of these discomforts he was not sensible. +For the mission he was set upon filled his thoughts and ran like a fever +in his blood. He lay awake at nights inventing schemes of evasion, and +each morning showed a flaw, and the schemes crumbled. Not that his faith +faltered. At some one moment he felt sure the perfect plan, swift and +secret, would be revealed to him, and he lived to seize the moment. The +people with whom he spoke became as shadows; the inns where he rested +were confused into a common semblance. He was like a man in a trance, +seeing ever before his eyes the guarded villa at Innspruck, and behind +the walls, patient and watchful, the face of the chosen woman; so that +it was almost with surprise that he looked down one afternoon from the +brim of a pass in the hills and saw beneath him, hooded with snow, the +roofs and towers of Ohlau. + +At Ohlau Wogan came to the end of his luck. From the moment when he +presented his letter he was aware of it. The Prince was broken by his +humiliation and the sufferings of his wife and daughter. He was even +inclined to resent them at the expense of the Chevalier, for in his +welcome to Wogan there was a measure of embarrassment. His shoulders, +which had before been erect, now stooped, his eyes were veiled, the fire +had burnt out in him; he was an old man visibly ageing to his grave. He +read the letter and re-read it. + +"No," said he, impatiently; "I must now think of my daughter. Her +dignity and her birth forbid that she should run like a criminal in fear +of capture, and at the peril very likely of her life, to a king who, +after all, is as yet without a crown." And then seeing Wogan flush at +the words, he softened them. "I frankly say to you, Mr. Warner, that I +know no one to whom I would sooner entrust my daughter than yourself, +were I persuaded to this project. But it is doomed to fail. It would +make us the laughing-stock of Europe, and I ask you to forget it. Do you +fancy the Emperor guards my daughter so ill that you, single-handed, can +take her from beneath his hand?" + +"Your Highness, I shall choose some tried friends to help me." + +"There is no single chance of success. I ask you to forget it and to +pass your Christmas here as my very good friend. The sight is longer in +age, Mr. Warner, than in youth, and I see far enough now to know that +the days of Don Quixote are dead. Here is a matter where all Europe is +ranged and alert on one side or the other. You cannot practise secrecy. +At Ohlau your face is known, your incognito too. Mr. Warner came to +Ohlau once before, and the business on which he came is common +knowledge. The motive of your visit now, which I tell you openly is very +grateful to me, will surely be suspected." + +Wogan had reason that night to acknowledge the justice of the Prince's +argument. He accepted his hospitality, thinking that with time he would +persuade him to allow the attempt; and after supper, while making +riddles in verse to amuse some of the ladies of the court, one of them, +the Countess of Berg, came forward from a corner where she had been busy +with pencil and paper and said, "It is our turn now. Here, Mr. Warner, +is an acrostic which I ask you to solve for me." And with a smile which +held a spice of malice she handed him the paper. Upon it there were ten +rhymed couplets. Wogan solved the first four, and found that the initial +letters of the words were C, L, E, M. The answer to the acrostic was +"Clementina." Wogan gave the paper back. + +"I can make neither head nor tail of it," said he. "The attempt is +beyond my powers." + +"Ah," said she, drily, "you own as much? I would never have believed you +would have owned it." + +"But what is the answer?" asked a voice at which Wogan started. + +"The answer," replied the Countess, "is Mary, Queen of Scots, who was +most unjustly imprisoned in Fotheringay," and she tore the paper into +tiny pieces. + +Wogan turned towards the voice which had so startled him and saw the +gossamer lady whom he had befriended on the road from Florence. At once +he rose and bowed to her. + +"I should have presented you before to my friend, Lady Featherstone," +said the Countess, "but it seems you are already acquainted." + +"Indeed, Mr. Warner did me a great service at a pinch," said Lady +Featherstone. "He was my postillion, though I never paid him, as I do +now in thanks." + +"Your postillion!" cried one or two of the ladies, and they gathered +about the great stove as Lady Featherstone told the story of Wogan's +charioting. + +"I bade him hurry," said she, "and he outsped my bidding. Never was +there a postillion so considerately inconsiderate. I was tossed like a +tennis ball, I was one black bruise, I bounced from cushion to cushion; +and then he drew up with a jerk, sprang off his horse, vanished into a +house and left me, panting and dishevelled, a twist of torn ribbons and +lace, alone in my carriage in the streets of Bologna." + +"Bologna. Ah!" said the Countess, with a smile of significance at Wogan. + +Wogan was looking at Lady Featherstone. His curiosity, thrust into the +back of his mind by the more important matter of his mission now +revived. What had been this lady's business who travelled alone to +Bologna and in such desperate haste? + +"Your Ladyship, I remember," he said, "gave me to understand that you +were sorely put to it to reach Bologna." + +Her Ladyship turned her blue eyes frankly upon Wogan. Then she lowered +them. + +"My brother," she explained, "lay at death's door in Venice. I had just +landed at Leghorn, where I left my maid to recover from the sea, and +hurrying across Italy as I did, I still feared that I should not see him +alive." + +The explanation was made readily in a low voice natural to one +remembering a great distress, but without any affectation of gesture or +so much as a glance sideways to note whether Wogan received it +trustfully or not. Wogan, indeed, was reassured in a great measure. +True, the Countess of Berg was now his declared enemy, but he need not +join all her friends in that hostility. + +"I was able, most happily," continued Lady Featherstone, "to send my +brother homewards in a ship a fortnight back, and so to stay with my +friend here on my way to Vienna, for we English are all bitten with the +madness of travel. Mr. Warner will bear me out?" + +"To be sure I will," said Wogan, stoutly. "For here am I in the depths +of winter journeying to the carnival in Italy." + +The Countess smiled, all disbelief and amusement, and Lady Featherstone +turned quickly towards him. + +"For my frankness I claim a like frankness in return," said she, with a +pretty imperiousness. + +Wogan was a little startled. He suddenly remembered that he had +pretended to know no English on the road to Bologna, nor had he given +any reason for his haste. But it was upon neither of these matters that +she desired to question him. + +"You spoke in parables," said she, "which are detestable things. You +said you would not lose your black horse for the world because the lady +you were to marry would ride upon it into your city of dreams. There's a +saying that has a provoking prettiness. I claim a frank answer." + +Wogan was silent, and his face took on the look of a dreamer. + +"Come," said one. It was the Princess Charlotte, the second daughter of +the Prince Sobieski, who spoke. "We shall not let you off," said she. + +Wogan knew that she would not. She was a girl who was never checked by +any inconvenience her speech might cause. Her tongue was a watchman's +rattle, and she never spoke but she laughed to point the speech. + +"Be frank," said the Countess; "it is a matter of the heart, and so +proper food for women." + +"True," answered Wogan, lightly, "it is a matter of the heart, and in +such matters can one be frank--even to oneself?" + +Wogan was immediately puzzled by the curious look Lady Featherstone +gave him. The words were a mere excuse, yet she seemed to take them very +seriously. Her eyes sounded him. + +"Yes," she said slowly; "are you frank, even to yourself?" and she spoke +as though a knowledge of the answer would make a task easier to her. + +Wogan's speculations, however, were interrupted by the entrance of +Princess Casimira, Sobieski's eldest daughter. Wogan welcomed her coming +for the first time in all his life, for she was a kill-joy, a person of +an extraordinary decorum. According to Wogan, she was "that black care +upon the horseman's back which the poets write about." Her first +question if she was spoken to was whether the speaker was from top to +toe fitly attired; her second, whether the words spoken were well-bred. +At this moment, however, her mere presence put an end to the demands for +an explanation of Wogan's saying about his horse, and in a grateful mood +to her he slipped from the room. + +This evening was but one of many during that Christmastide. Wogan must +wear an easy countenance, though his heart grew heavy as lead. The +Countess of Berg was the Prince Constantine's favourite; and Wogan was +not slow to discover that her smiling face and quiet eyes hid the most +masterful woman at that court. He made himself her assiduous servant, +whether in hunting amid the snow or in the entertainments at the palace, +but a quizzical deliberate word would now and again show him that she +was still his enemy. With the Princess Casimira he was a profound +critic of observances: he invented a new cravat and was most careful +that there should never be a wrinkle in his stockings; with the Princess +Charlotte he laughed till his head sang. He played all manner of parts; +the palace might have been the stage of a pantomime and himself the +harlequin. But for all his efforts it did not seem that he advanced his +cause; and if he made headway one evening with the Prince, the next +morning he had lost it, and so Christmas came and passed. + +But two days after Christmas a courier brought a letter to the castle. +He came in the evening, and the letter was carried to Wogan while he was +at table. He noticed at once that it was in his King's hand, and he +slipped it quickly into his pocket. It may have been something +precipitate in his manner, or it may have been merely that all were on +the alert to mark his actions, but at once curiosity was aroused. No +plain words were said; but here and there heads nodded together and +whispered, and while some eyed Wogan suspiciously, a few women whose +hearts were tuned to a sympathy with the Princess in her imprisonment, +or touched with the notion of a romantic attachment, smiled upon him +their encouragement. The Countess of Berg for once was unobservant, +however. + +Wogan made his escape from the company as soon as he could, and going up +to his apartments read the letter. The moon was at its full, and what +with the clear, frosty air, and the snow stretched over the world like +a white counterpane, he was able to read the letter by the window +without the light of a candle. It was written in the Chevalier's own +cipher and hand; it asked anxiously for news and gave some. Wogan had +had occasion before to learn that cipher by heart. He stood by the +window and spelled the meaning. Then he turned to go down; but at the +door his foot slipped upon the polished boards, and he stumbled onto his +knee. He picked himself up, and thinking no more of the matter rejoined +the company in a room where the Countess of Berg was playing upon a +harp. + +"The King," said Wogan, drawing the Prince apart, "leaves Bologna for +Rome." + +"So the letter came from him?" asked the Prince, with an eagerness which +could not but seem hopeful to his companion. + +"And in his own hand," replied Wogan. + +The Prince shuffled and hesitated as though he was curious to hear +particulars. Wogan thought it wise to provoke his curiosity by +disregarding it. It seemed that there was wisdom in his reticence, for a +little later the Prince took him aside while the Countess of Berg was +still playing upon her harp, and said,-- + +"Single-handed you could do nothing. You would need friends." + +Wogan took a slip of paper from his pocket and gave it to the Prince. + +"On that slip," said he, "I wrote down the names of all the friends +whom I could trust, and by the side of the names the places where I +could lay my hands upon them. One after the other I erased the names +until only three remained." + +The Prince nodded and read out the names. + +"Gaydon, Misset, O'Toole. They are good men?" + +"The flower of Ireland. Those three names have been my comfort these +last three weeks." + +"And all the three at Schlestadt. How comes that about?" + +"Your Highness, they are all three officers in Dillon's Irish regiment, +and so have that further advantage." + +"Advantage?" + +"Your Highness," said Wogan, "Schlestadt is near to Strasbourg, which +again is not far from Innspruck, and being in French territory would be +the most convenient place to set off from." + +There was a sound of a door shutting; the Prince started, looked at +Wogan, and laughed. He had been upon the verge of yielding; but for that +door Wogan felt sure he would have yielded. Now, however, he merely +walked away to the Countess of Berg, and sitting beside her asked her to +play a particular tune. But he still held the slip of paper in his hand +and paid but a scanty heed to the music, now and then looking doubtfully +towards Wogan, now and then scanning that long list of names. His lips, +too, moved as though he was framing the three selected names, Gaydon, +Misset, O'Toole, and "Schlestadt" as a bracket uniting them. Then he +suddenly rose up and crossed the room to Wogan. + +"My daughter wrote that a woman must attend her. It is a necessary +provision." + +"Your Highness, Misset has a wife, and the wife matches him." + +"They are warned to be ready?" + +"At your Highness's first word that slip of paper travels to Schlestadt. +It is unsigned, it imperils no one, it betrays nothing. But it will tell +its story none the less surely to those three men, for Gaydon knows my +hand." + +The Prince smiled in approval. + +"You have prudence, Mr. Warner, as well as audacity," said he. He gave +the paper back, listened for a little to the Countess, who was bending +over her harp-strings, and then remarked, "The Prince's letter was in +his own hand too?" + +"But in cipher." + +"Ah!" + +The Prince was silent for a while. He balanced himself first on one +foot, then on the other. + +"Ciphers," said he, "are curious things, compelling to the imagination +and a provocation to the intellect." + +Mr. Wogan kept a grave face and he replied with unconcern, though his +heart beat quick; for if the Prince had so much desire to see the +Chevalier's letter, he must be well upon his way to consenting to +Wogan's plan. + +"If your Highness will do me the honour to look at this cipher. It has +baffled the most expert." + +His Highness condescended to be pleased with Wogan's suggestion. Wogan +crossed the room towards the door; but before he reached it, the +Countess of Berg suddenly took her fingers from her harp-strings with a +gesture of annoyance. + +"Mr. Warner," she said, "will you do me the favour to screw this wire +tighter?" And once or twice she struck it with her fingers. + +"May I claim that privilege?" said the Prince. + +"Your Highness does me too much honour," said the Countess, but the +Prince was already at her side. At once she pointed out to him the +particular string. Wogan went from the room and up the great staircase. +He was lodged in a wing of the palace. From the head of the staircase he +proceeded down a long passage. Towards the end of this passage another +short passage branched off at a right angle on the left-hand side. At +the corner of the two passages stood a table with a lamp and some +candlesticks. This time Wogan took a candle, and lighting it at the lamp +turned into the short passage. It was dark but for the light of Wogan's +candle, and at the end of it facing him were two doors side by side. +Both doors were closed, and of these the one on the left gave onto his +room. + +Wogan had walked perhaps halfway from the corner to his door before he +stopped. He stopped suddenly and held his breath. Then he shaded his +candle with the palm of his hand and looked forward. Immediately he +turned, and walking on tiptoe came silently back into the big passage. +Even this was not well lighted; it stretched away upon his right and +left, full of shadows. But it was silent. The only sounds which reached +Wogan as he stood there and listened were the sounds of people moving +and speaking at a great distance. He blew out his candle, cautiously +replaced it on the table, and crept down again towards his room. There +was no window in this small passage, there was no light there at all +except a gleam of silver in front of him and close to the ground. That +gleam of silver was the moonlight shining between the bottom of one of +the doors and the boards of the passage. And that door was not the door +of Wogan's room, but the room beside it. Where his door stood, there +might have been no door at all. + +Yet the moon which shone through the windows of one room must needs also +shine into the other, unless, indeed, the curtains were drawn. But +earlier in the evening Wogan had read a letter by the moonlight at his +window; the curtains were not drawn. There was, therefore, a rug, an +obstruction of some sort against the bottom of the door. But earlier in +the evening Wogan's foot had slipped upon the polished boards; there had +been no mat or skin at all. It had been pushed there since. Wogan could +not doubt for what reason. It was to conceal the light of a lamp or +candle within the room. Someone, in a word, was prying in Wogan's room, +and Wogan began to consider who. It was not the Countess, who was +engaged upon her harp, but the Countess had tried to detain him. Wogan +was startled as he understood the reason of her harp becoming so +suddenly untuned. She had spoken to him with so natural a spontaneity, +she had accepted the Prince's aid with so complete an absence of +embarrassment; but none the less Wogan was sure that she knew. Moreover, +a door had shut--yes, while he was speaking to the Prince a door had +shut. + +So far Wogan's speculations had travelled when the moonlight streamed +out beneath his door too. It made now a silver line across the passage +broken at the middle by the wall between the rooms. The mat had been +removed, the candle put out, the prying was at an end; in another moment +the door would surely open. Now Wogan, however anxious to discover who +it was that spied, was yet more anxious that the spy should not discover +that the spying was detected. He himself knew, and so was armed; he did +not wish to arm his enemies with a like knowledge. There was no corner +in the passage to conceal him; there was no other door behind which he +could slip. When the spy came out, Wogan would inevitably be discovered. +He made up his mind on the instant. He crept back quickly and silently +out of the mouth of the passage, then he made a noise with his feet, +turned again into the passage, and walked loudly towards his door. Even +so he was only just in time. Had he waited a moment longer, he would +have been detected. For even as he turned the corner there was already a +vertical line of silver on the passage wall; the door had been already +opened. But as his footsteps sounded on the boards, that line +disappeared. + +He walked slowly, giving his spy time to replace the letter, time to +hide. He purposely carried no candle, he reached his door and opened it. +The room to all seeming was empty. Wogan crossed to a table, looking +neither to the right nor the left, above all not looking towards the bed +hangings. He found the letter upon the table just as he had left it. It +could convey no knowledge of his mission, he was sure. It had not even +the appearance of a letter in cipher; it might have been a mere +expression of Christmas good wishes from one friend to another. But to +make his certainty more sure, and at the same time to show that he had +no suspicion anyone was hiding in the room, he carried the letter over +to the window, and at once he was aware of the spy's hiding-place. It +was not the bed hangings, but close at his side the heavy window curtain +bulged. The spy was at his very elbow; he had but to lift his arm--and +of a sudden the letter slipped from his hand to the floor. He did not +drop it on purpose, he was fairly surprised; for looking down to read +the letter he had seen protruding from the curtain a jewelled shoe +buckle, and the foot which the buckle adorned seemed too small and +slender for a man's. + +Wogan had an opportunity to make certain. He knelt down and picked up +the letter; the foot was a woman's. As he rose up again, the curtain +ever so slightly stirred. Wogan pretended to have remarked nothing; he +stood easily by the window with his eyes upon his letter and his mind +busy with guessing what woman his spy might be. And he remained on +purpose for some while in this attitude, designing it as a punishment. +So long as he stood by the window that unknown woman cheek by jowl with +him must hold her breath, must never stir, must silently endure an agony +of fear at each movement that he made. + +At last he moved, and as he turned away he saw something so unexpected +that it startled him. Indeed, for the moment it did more than startle +him, it chilled him. He understood that slight stirring of the curtain. +The woman now held a dagger in her hand, and the point of the blade +stuck out and shone in the moonlight like a flame. + +Wogan became angry. It was all very well for the woman to come spying +into his room; but to take a dagger to him, to think a dagger in a +woman's hand could cope with him,--that was too preposterous. Wogan felt +very much inclined to sweep that curtain aside and tell his visitor how +he had escaped from Newgate and played hide-and-seek amongst the +chimney-pots. And although he restrained himself from that, he allowed +his anger to get the better of his prudence. Under the impulse of his +anger he acted. It was a whimsical thing that he did, and though he +suffered for it he could never afterwards bring himself to regret it. He +deliberately knelt down and kissed the instep of the foot which +protruded from the curtain. He felt the muscles of the foot tighten, but +the foot was not withdrawn. The curtain shivered and shook, but no cry +came from behind it, and again the curtain hung motionless. Wogan went +out of the room and carried the letter to the Prince. The Countess of +Berg was still playing upon her harp, and she gave no sign that she +remarked his entrance. She did not so much as shoot one glance of +curiosity towards him. The Prince carried the letter off to his cabinet, +while Wogan sat down beside the Countess and looked about the room. + +"I have not seen Lady Featherstone this evening," said he. + +"Have you not?" asked the Countess, easily. + +"Not so much as her foot," replied Wogan. + +The conviction came upon him suddenly. Her hurried journey to Bologna +and her presence at Ohlau were explained to him now by her absence from +the room. His own arrival at Bologna had not remained so secret as he +had imagined. The fragile and gossamer lady, too flowerlike for the +world's rough usage, was the woman who had spied in his room and who had +possessed the courage to stand silent and motionless behind the curtain +after her presence there had been discovered. Wogan had a picture before +his eyes of the dagger she had held. It was plain that she would stop at +nothing to hinder this marriage, to prevent the success of his design; +and somehow the contrast between her appearance and her actions had +something uncanny about it. Wogan was inclined to shiver as he sat +chatting with the Countess. He was not reassured when Lady Featherstone +boldly entered the room; she meant to face him out. He remarked, +however, with a trifle of satisfaction that for the first time she wore +rouge upon her cheeks. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +Wogan, however, was not immediately benefited by his discovery. He knew +that if a single whisper of it reached the Prince's ear there would be +at once an end to his small chances. The old man would take alarm; he +might punish the offender, but he would none the less surely refuse his +consent to Wogan's project. Wogan must keep his lips quite closed and +let his antagonists do boldly what they would. + +And that they were active he found a way to discover. The Countess from +this time plied him with kindness. He must play cards with her and +Prince Constantine in the evening; he must take his coffee in her +private apartments in the morning. So upon one of these occasions he +spoke of his departure from Ohlau. + +"I shall go by way of Prague;" and he stopped in confusion and corrected +himself quickly. "At least, I am not sure. There are other ways into +Italy." + +The Countess showed no more concern than she had shown over her +harp-string. She talked indifferently of other matters as though she had +barely heard his remark; but she fell into the trap. Wogan was aware +that the Governor of Prague was her kinsman; and that afternoon he left +the castle alone, and taking the road to Vienna, turned as soon as he +was out of sight and hurried round the town until he came out upon the +road to Prague. He hid himself behind a hedge a mile from Ohlau, and had +not waited half an hour before a man came riding by in hot haste. The +man wore the Countess's livery of green and scarlet; Wogan decided not +to travel by way of Prague, and returned to the castle content with his +afternoon's work. He had indeed more reason to be content with it than +he knew, for he happened to have remarked the servant's face as well as +his livery, and so at a later time was able to recognise it again. He +had no longer any doubt that a servant in the same livery was well upon +his way to Vienna. The roads were bad, it was true, and the journey +long; but Wogan had not the Prince's consent, and could not tell when he +would obtain it. The servant might return with the Emperor's order for +his arrest before he had obtained it. Wogan was powerless. He sent his +list of names to Gaydon in Schlestadt, but that was the only precaution +he could take. The days passed; Wogan spent them in unavailing +persuasions, and New Year's Day came and found him still at Ohlau and in +a great agitation and distress. + +Upon that morning, however, while he was dressing, there came a rap upon +his door, and when he opened it he saw the Prince's treasurer, a foppish +gentleman, very dainty in his words. + +"Mr. Warner," said the treasurer, "his Highness has hinted to me his +desires; he has moulded them into the shape of a prayer or a request." + +"In a word, he has bidden you," said Wogan. + +"Fie, sir! There's a barbarous and improper word, an ill-sounding word; +upon my honour, a word without dignity or merit and banishable from +polite speech. His Highness did most prettily entreat me with a fine +gentleness of condescension befitting a Sunday or a New Year's Day to +bring and present and communicate from hand to hand a gift,--a most +incomparable proper gift, the mirror and image of his most incomparable +proper friendship." + +Wogan bowed, and requested the treasurer to enter and be seated the +while he recovered his breath. + +"Nay, Mr. Warner, I must be concise, puritanical, and unadorned in my +language as any raw-head or bloody-bones. The cruel, irrevocable moments +pass. I could consume an hour, sir, before I touched as I may say the +hem of the reason of my coming." + +"Sir, I do not doubt it," said Wogan. + +"But I will not hinder you from forthwith immediately and at once +incorporating with your most particular and inestimable treasures this +jewel, this turquoise of heaven's own charming blue, encased and +decorated with gold." + +The treasurer drew the turquoise from his pocket. It was of the size of +an egg. He placed it in Wogan's hand, who gently returned it. + +"I cannot take it," said he. + +"Gemini!" cried the treasurer. "But it is more than a turquoise, Mr. +Warner. Jewellers have delved in it. It has become subservient to man's +necessities. It is a snuff-box." + +"I cannot take it." + +"King John of Poland, he whom the vulgar call Glorious John, did rescue +and enlarge it from its slavery to the Grand Vizier of Turkey at the +great battle of Vienna. There is no other in the world--" + +Wogan cut the treasurer short. + +"You will take it again to his Highness. You will express to him my +gratitude for his kindness, and you will say furthermore these words: +'Mr. Warner cannot carry back into Italy a present for himself and a +refusal for his Prince.'" + +Wogan spoke with so much dignity that the treasurer had no words to +answer him. He stood utterly bewildered; he stared at the jewel. + +"Here is a quandary!" he exclaimed. "I do declare every circumstance of +me trembles," and shaking his head he went away. But in a little he came +again. + +"His Highness distinguishes you, Mr. Warner, with imperishable honours. +His Highness solicits your company to a solitary dinner. You shall dine +with him alone. His presence and unfettered conversation shall season +your soup and be the condiments of your meat." + +Wogan's heart jumped. There could be only one reason for so unusual an +invitation on such a day, and he was not mistaken; for as soon as the +Prince was served in a little room, he dismissed the lackeys and +presented again the turquoise snuff-box with his own hands. + +"See, Mr. Wogan, your persuasions and your conduct have gained me over," +said he. "Your refusal of this bagatelle assures me of your honour. I +trust myself entirely to your discretion; I confide my beloved daughter +to your care. Take from my hands the gift you refused this morning, and +be assured that no prince ever gave to any man such full powers as I +will give to you to-night." + +Wogan's gratitude wellnigh overcame him. The thing that he had worked +for and almost despaired of had come to pass. For a while he could not +speak; he flung himself upon his knees and kissed the Prince's hand. +That very night he received the letter giving him full powers, and the +next morning he drove off in a carriage of his Highness drawn by six +Polish horses towards the town of Strahlen on the road to Prague. At +Strahlen he stayed a day, feigning a malady, and sent the carriage back. +The following day, however, he took horse, and riding along by-roads and +lanes avoided Prague and hurried towards Schlestadt. + +He rode watchfully, avoiding towns, and with an eye alert for every +passer-by. That he was ahead of any courier from the Emperor at Vienna +he did not doubt, but, on the other hand, the Countess of Berg and Lady +Featherstone had the advantage of him by some four days. There would be +no lack of money to hinder him; there would be no scruple as to the +means. Wogan remembered the moment in his bedroom when he had seen the +dagger bright in the moon's rays. If he could not be arrested, there +were other ways to stop him. Accidents may happen to any man. + +However, he rode unhindered with the Prince's commission safe against +his breast. He felt the paper a hundred times a day to make sure that it +was not stolen nor lost, nor reduced to powder by a miracle. Day by day +his fears diminished, since day by day he drew a day's journey nearer to +Schlestadt. The paper became a talisman in his thoughts,--a thing +endowed with magic properties to make him invisible like the cloak or +cap of the fairy tales. Those few lines in writing not a week back had +seemed an unattainable prize, yet he had them; and so now they promised +him that other unattainable thing, the enlargement of the Princess. It +was in his nature, too, to grow buoyant in proportion to the +difficulties of his task. He rode forward, therefore, with a good heart, +and one sombre evening of rain came to a village some miles beyond +Augsburg. + +The village was a straggling half-mile of low cottages, lost as it were +on the level of a wide plain. Across this plain, bare but for a few +lines of poplars and stunted willow-trees, Wogan had ridden all the +afternoon; and so little did the thatched cottages break the monotony of +the plain's appearance, that though he had had the village within his +vision all that while, he came upon it unawares. The dusk was gathering, +and already through the tiny windows the meagre lights gleamed upon the +road and gave to the falling raindrops the look of steel beads. Four +days would now bring Wogan to Schlestadt. The road was bad and full of +holes. He determined to go no farther that night if he could find a +lodging in the village, and coming upon a man who stood in his path he +stopped his horse. + +"Is there an inn where a traveller may sleep?" he asked. + +"Assuredly," replied the man, "and find forage for his horse. The last +house--but I will myself show your Honour the way." + +"There is no need, my friend, that you should take a colic," said Wogan. + +"I shall earn enough drink to correct the colic," said the man. He had a +sack over his head and shoulders to protect him from the rain, and +stepped out in front of Wogan's horse. They came to the end of the +street and passed on into the open darkness. About twenty yards farther +a house stood by itself at the roadside, but there were only lights in +one or two of the upper windows, and it held out no promise of +hospitality. In front of it, however, the man stopped; he opened the +door and halloaed into the passage. Wogan stopped too, and above his +head something creaked and groaned like a gibbet in the wind. He looked +up and saw a sign-board glimmering in the dusk with a new coat of white +paint. He had undoubtedly come to the inn, and he dismounted. + +The landlord advanced at that moment to the door. + +"My man," said he, "will take your horse to the stable;" and the fellow +who had guided Wogan led the horse off. + +"Oh, is he your man?" said Wogan. "Ah!" And he followed the landlord +into the house. + +It was not only the sign-board which had been newly painted, for in the +narrow passage the landlord stopped Wogan. + +"Have a care, sir," said he; "the walls are wet. It will be best if you +stand still while I go forward and bring a light." + +He went forward in the dark and opened a door at the end of the passage. +A glow of ruddy light came through the doorway, and Wogan caught a +glimpse of a brick-floored kitchen and a great open chimney and one or +two men on a bench before the fire. Then the door was again closed. The +closing of the door seemed to Wogan a churlish act. + +"The hospitality," said he to himself, "which plants a man in the road +so that a traveller on a rainy night may not miss his bed should at +least leave the kitchen door open. Why should I stay here in the dark?" + +Wogan went forward, and from the careful way in which he walked,--a way +so careful and stealthy indeed that his footsteps made no sound,--it +might have been inferred that he believed the floor to be newly painted +too. He had, at all events, no such scruples about the kitchen door, for +he seized the handle and flung it open quickly. He was met at once by a +cold draught of wind. A door opposite and giving onto a yard at the back +had been opened at precisely the same moment; and as Wogan stepped +quickly in at his door a man stepped quickly out by the door opposite +and was lost in the darkness. + +"What! Are you going?" the landlord cried after him as he turned from +the fire at which he was lighting a candle. + +"Wilhelm has a wife and needs must," at once said a woman who was +reaching down some plates from a dresser. + +The landlord turned towards the passage and saw Wogan in the doorway. + +"You found your way, sir," said he, looking at Wogan anxiously. + +"Nor are your walls any poorer of paint on that account," said Wogan as +he took his wet cloak and flung it over a chair. + +The landlord blew out his candle and busied himself about laying the +table. A great iron pot swung over the fire by a chain, and the lid +danced on the top and allowed a savoury odour to escape. Wogan sat +himself down before the fire and his clothes began to steam. + +"You laugh at my paint, sir," said the landlord. He was a fat, +good-humoured-looking man, communicative in his manner as a Boniface +should be, and his wife was his very complement. "You laugh at my +paint, but it is, after all, a very important thing. What is a great +lady without her rouge-pot, when you come to think of it? It is the same +with an inn. It must wear paint if it is to attract attention and make a +profit." + +"There is philosophy in the comparison," said Wogan. + +"Sir, an innkeeper cannot fail of philosophy if he has his eyes and a +spark of intelligence. The man who took refuge in a tub because the +follies of his fellows so angered him was the greatest fool of them all. +He should have kept an inn on the road to Athens, for then the follies +would have put money into his pocket and made him laugh instead of +growl." + +His wife came over to the fireplace and lifted the lid of the pot. + +"The supper is ready," said she. + +"And perhaps, sir, while you are eating it you can think of a name for +my inn." + +"Why, it has a sign-board already," said Wogan, "and a name, too, I +suppose." + +"It has a sign-board, but without a device," said the landlord, and +while Wogan drew a chair to the table he explained his predicament. + +"There is another inn five miles along the road, and travellers prefer +to make their halt there. They will not stop here. My father, sir, set +it all down to paint. It was his dream, sir, to paint the house from +floor to ceiling; his last words bade me pinch and save until I could +paint. Well, here is the house painted, and I am anxious for a new +device and name which shall obliterate the memory of the other. 'The +Black Eagle' is its old name. Ask any traveller familiar with the road +between Augsburg and Schlestadt, and he will counsel you to avoid 'The +Black Eagle.' You are travelling to Schlestadt, perhaps." + +Wogan had started ever so slightly. + +"To Strasbourg," he said, and thereafter ate his supper in silence, +taking count with himself. "My friend," so his thoughts ran, "the sooner +you reach Schlestadt the better. Here are you bleating like a sheep at a +mere chance mention of your destination. You have lived too close with +this fine scheme of yours. You need your friends." + +Wogan began to be conscious of an unfamiliar sense of loneliness. It +grew upon him that evening while he sat at the table; it accompanied him +up the stairs to bed. Other men of his age were now seated comfortably +by their own hearths, while he was hurrying about Europe, a vagabond +adventurer, risking his life for--and at once the reason why he was +risking his life rose up to convict him a grumbler. + +The landlord led him into a room in the front of the house which held a +great canopied bed and little other furniture. There was not even a +curtain to the window. Wogan raised his candle and surveyed the dingy +walls. + +"You have not spent much of your new paint on your guest-room, my +friend." + +"Sir, you have not marked the door," said his host, reproachfully. + +"True," said Wogan, with a yawn; "the door is admirably white." + +"The frame of the door does not suffer in a comparison." The landlord +raised and lowered his candle that Wogan might see. + +"I do not wish to be unjust to the frame of the door," said Wogan, and +he drew off his boots. The landlord bade his guest good-night and +descended the stairs. + +Wogan, being a campaigner, was methodical even though lost in +reflection. He was reflecting now why in the world he should lately have +become sensible of loneliness; but at the same time he put the Prince's +letter beneath his pillow and a sheathed hunting-knife beside the +letter. He had always been lonely, and the fact had never troubled him; +he placed a chair on the left of the bed and his candle on the chair. +Besides, he was not really lonely, having a host of friends whom he had +merely to seek out; he took the charges from his pistol lest they should +be damp, and renewed them and placed the pistols by the candle. He had +even begun to pity himself for his loneliness, and pity of that sort, he +recognised, was a discreditable quality; the matter was altogether very +disquieting. He propped his sword against the chair and undressed. Wogan +cast back in his memories for the first sensations of loneliness. They +were recent, since he had left Ohlau, indeed. He opened the window; the +rain splashed in on the sill, pattered in the street puddles below, and +fell across the country with a continuous roar as though the level plain +was a stretched drum. No; he had only felt lonely since he had come near +to Schlestadt, since, in a word, he had deemed himself to have +outstripped pursuit. He got into his bed and blew out the candle. + +For a moment the room was black as pitch, then on his left side the +darkness thinned at one point and a barred square of grey became +visible; the square of grey was the window. Wogan understood that his +loneliness came upon him with the respite from his difficulties, and +concluded that, after all, it was as well that he had not a comfortable +fireside whereby to sun himself. He turned over on his right side and +saw the white door and its white frame. The rain made a dreary sound +outside the window, but in three days he would be at Schlestadt. Besides +he fell asleep. + +And in a little he dreamed. He dreamed that he was swinging on a gibbet +before the whole populace of Innspruck, that he died to his bewilderment +without any pain whatever, but that pain came to him after he was quite +dead,--not bodily pain at all, but an anguish of mind because the chains +by which he was hanged would groan and creak, and the populace, +mistaking that groaning for his cries, scoffed at him and ridiculed his +King for sending to rescue the Princess Clementina a marrowless thing +that could not die like a man. Wogan stirred in his sleep and waked up. +The rain had ceased, and a light wind blew across the country. Outside +the sign-board creaked and groaned upon its stanchion. Once he became +aware of that sound he could no longer sleep for listening to it; and at +last he sprang out of bed, and leaning out of the window lifted the +sign-board off the stanchion and into his bedroom. + +It was a plain white board without any device on it. "True," thought +Wogan, "the man wants a new name for his inn." He propped the board +against the left side of his bed, since that was nearest to the window, +got between the sheets, and began to think over names. He turned on his +right side and fell asleep again. + +He was not to sleep restfully that night. He waked again, but very +slowly, and without any movement of his body. He lay with his face +towards the door, dreamily considering that the landlord, for all his +pride in his new paint, had employed a bad workman who had left a black +strip of the door unpainted,--a fairly wide strip, too, which his host +should never have overlooked. + +Wogan was lazily determining to speak to the landlord about it when his +half-awakened mind was diverted by a curious phenomenon, a delusion of +the eyes such as he had known to have befallen him before when he had +stared for a long while on any particular object: the strip of black +widened and widened. Wogan waited for it to contract, as it would be +sure to do. But it did not contract, and--so Wogan waked up completely. + +He waked up with a shock of the heart, with all his senses startled and +strained. But he had been gradually waking before, and so by neither +movement nor cry did he betray that he was awake. He had not locked the +door of his room; that widening strip of black ran vertically down from +the lintel to the ground and between the white door and the white door +frame. The door was being cautiously pushed open; the strip of black was +the darkness of the passage coming through. + +Wogan slid his hand beneath his pillow, and drew the knife from its +sheath as silently as the door opened. The strip of black ceased to +widen, there was a slight scuffling sound upon the floor which Wogan was +at no loss to understand. It was the sound of a man crawling into the +room upon his hands and knees. + +Wogan lay on his side and felt grateful to his host,--an admirable +man,--for he had painted his door white, and now he crawled through it +on his hands and knees. No doubt he would crawl to the side of the bed; +he did. To feel, no doubt, for Mr. Wogan's coat and breeches and any +little letter which might be hiding in the pockets. But here Wogan was +wrong. For he saw a dark thing suddenly on the counterpane at the edge +of the bed. The dark thing travelled upwards very softly; it had four +fingers and a thumb. It was, no doubt, travelling towards the pillow, +and as soon as it got there--but Wogan watching that hand beneath his +dosed eyelids had again to admit that he was wrong. It did not travel +towards the pillow; to his astonishment it stole across towards him, it +touched his chest very gently, and then he understood. The hand was +creeping upwards towards his throat. + +Meanwhile Wogan had seen no face, though the face must be just below the +level of the bed. He only saw the hand and the arm behind it. He moved +as if in his sleep, and the hand disappeared. As if in his sleep, he +flung out his left arm and felt for the sign-board standing beside his +bed. The bed was soft. Wogan wanted something hard, and it had occurred +to him that the sign-board would very well serve his turn. An idea, too, +which seemed to him diverting, had presented itself to his mind. + +With a loud sigh and a noisy movement such as a man halfway between +wakefulness and sleep may make he flung himself over onto his left side. +At the same moment he lifted the white sign-board onto the bed. It +seemed that he could not rest on his left side, for he flung over again +to his right and pulled the bedclothes over as he turned. The sign-board +now lay flat upon the bed, but on the right side between himself and the +man upon the floor. His mouth uttered a little murmur of contentment, he +drew down the hand beneath the pillow, and in a second was breathing +regularly and peacefully. + +[Illustration: "WITH HIS RIGHT ARM HE DROVE HIS HUNTING KNIFE DOWN INTO +THE BACK OF THE HAND."--_Page 69_.] + +The hand crept onto the bed again and upwards, and suddenly lay spread +out upon the board and quite still. Just for a second the owner of that +hand had been surprised and paralysed by the unexpected. It was only +that second which Wogan needed. He sat up, and with his right arm he +drove his hunting knife down into the back of the hand and pinned it +fast to the board; with his left he felt for, found, and gripped a mouth +already open to cry out. He dropped his hunting knife, caught the +intruder round the waist, lifted him onto the bed, and setting a knee +upon his chest gagged him with an end of the sheet. The man fought +wildly with his free hand, beating the air. Wogan knelt upon that arm +with his other knee. + +Wogan needed a rope, but since he had none he used the sheets and bound +his prisoner to the bed. Then he got up and went to the door. The house +was quite silent, quite dark. Wogan shut the door gently--there was no +key in the lock--and bending over the bed looked into the face of his +assailant. The face was twisted with pain, the whites of the eyes glared +horribly, but Wogan could see that the man was his landlord. + +He stood up and thought. There was another man who had met him in the +village and had guided him to the inn; there was still a third who had +gone out of the kitchen as Wogan had entered it; there was the wife, +too, who might be awake. + +Wogan crossed to the window and looked out. The window was perhaps +twenty feet from the ground, but the stanchion was three feet below the +window. He quickly put on his clothes, slipped the letter from under his +pillow into a pocket, strapped his saddle-bag and lowered it from the +window by a blanket. He had already one leg on the sill when a +convulsive movement of the man on the bed made him stop. He climbed back +into the room, drew the knife out of the board and out of the hand +pinned to the board, and making a bandage wrapped the wound up. + +"You must lie there till morning, my friend," Wogan whispered in his +ear, "but here's a thing to console you. I have found a name for your +inn; I have painted the device upon your sign-board. The 'Inn of the +Five Red Fingers.' There's never a passer-by but will stop to inquire +the reason of so conspicuous a sign;" and Wogan climbed out of the +window, lowered himself till he hung at the full length of his arms from +the stanchion, and dropped on the ground. He picked up his saddle-bag +and crept round the house to the stable. The door needed only a push to +open it. In the hay-loft above he heard a man snoring. Mr. Wogan did not +think it worth while to disturb him. He saddled his horse, walked it out +into the yard, mounted, and rode quietly away. + +He had escaped, but without much credit to himself. + +"There was no key in the door," he thought. "I should have noticed it. +Misset, the man of resources, would have tilted a chair backwards +against that door with its top bar wedged beneath the door handle." +Certainly Wogan needed Misset if he was to succeed in his endeavour. He +was sunk in humiliation; his very promise to rescue the Princess shrank +from its grandeur and became a mere piece of impertinence. But he still +had his letter in his pocket, and in time that served to enhearten him. +Only two more days, he thought. On the third night he would sleep in +Schlestadt. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The next afternoon Wogan came to the town of Ulm. + +"Gaydon," he said to himself as he watched its towers and the smoke +curling upwards from its chimneys, "would go no further to-day with this +letter in his pocket. Gaydon--the cautious Gaydon--would sleep in this +town and in its most populous quarter. Gaydon would put up at the +busiest inn. Charles Wogan will follow Gaydon's example." + +Wogan rode slowly through the narrow streets of gabled houses until he +came to the market square. The square was frequented; its great fountain +was playing; citizens were taking the air with their wives and children; +the chief highway of the town ran through it; on one side stood the +frescoed Rathhaus, and opposite to it there was a spacious inn. Wogan +drew up at the doorway and saw that the hall was encumbered with +baggage. "Gaydon would stop here," said he, and he dismounted. The +porter came forward and took his horse. + +"I need a room," said Wogan, and he entered the house. There were people +going up and down the stairs. While he was unstrapping his valise in his +bedroom, a servant with an apron about his waist knocked at the door +and inquired whether he could help him. + +"No," said Wogan; and he thought with more confidence than ever, "here, +to be sure, is where Gaydon would sleep." + +He supped at the ordinary in the company of linen merchants and +travellers, and quite recovered his spirits. He smoked a pipe of tobacco +on a bench under the trees of the square, and giving an order that he +should be called at five went up to his bedroom. + +There was a key in the lock of the door, which Wogan turned; he also +tilted a chair and wedged the handle. He opened the window and looked +out. His room was on the first floor and not very high from the ground. +A man might possibly climb through the window. Gaydon would assuredly +close the shutters and the window, so that no one could force an +entrance without noise. Wogan accordingly did what Gaydon would +assuredly have done, and when he blew out his candle found himself in +consequence in utter darkness. No glimmer of light was anywhere visible. +He had his habits like another, and one of them was to sleep without +blinds or curtains drawn. His present deflection from this habit made +him restless; he was tired, he wished above all things to sleep, but +sleep would not come. He turned from one side to the other, he punched +his pillows, he tried to sleep with his head low, and when that failed +with his head high. + +He resigned himself in the end to a sleepless night, and lying in his +bed drew some comfort from the sound of voices and the tread of feet in +the passages and the rooms about him. These, at all events, were +companionable, and they assured him of safety. But in a while they +ceased, and he was left in a silence as absolute as the darkness. He +endured this silence for perhaps half an hour, and then all manner of +infinitesimal sounds began to stir about him. The lightest of footsteps +moved about his bed, faint sighs breathed from very close at hand, even +his name was softly whispered. He sat suddenly up in his bed, and at +once all these sounds became explained to him. They came from the street +and the square outside the window. So long as he sat up they were +remote, but the moment he lay down again they peopled the room. + +"Sure," said Wogan, "here is a lesson for architects. Build no shutters +to a house when the man that has to live in it has a spark of +imagination, else will he go stark raving mad before the mortar's dry. +Window shutters are window shutters, but they are the doors of Bedlam as +well. Now Gaydon should have slept in this room. Gaydon's a great man. +Gaydon has a great deal of observation and common sense, and was never +plagued with a flim-flam of fancies. To be sure, I need Gaydon, but +since I have not Gaydon, I'll light a candle." + +With that Wogan got out of bed. He had made himself so secure with his +key and his tilted chair and his shutters that he had not thought of +placing his candle by his bedside. It stood by his looking-glass on the +table. Now the room was so pitch dark that Wogan could do no more than +guess at the position even of the window. The table, he remembered, was +not far from the door, and the door was at some distance from his bed, +and in the wall on his right. He moved forward in the darkness with his +hands in front of him, groping for the table. The room was large; in a +little his hands touched something, and that something was a pillar of +the bed. He had missed his way in his bedroom. Wogan laughed to himself +and started off again; and the next thing which his outstretched hands +touched was a doorknob. The table should now be a little way to his +left. He was just turning away in that direction, when it occurred to +him that he ought to have felt the rim of the top bar of his tilted +chair underneath the door-handle. He stooped down and felt for the +chair; there was no chair, and he stood very still. + +The fears bred of imagination had now left him; he was restored by the +shock of an actual danger. He leaned forward quietly and felt if the key +was still in the lock. But there was no lock to this door. Wogan felt +the surface of the door; it was of paper. It was plainly the door of a +cupboard in the wall, papered after the same pattern as the wall, which +by the flickering light of his single candle he had overlooked. + +He opened the door and stretched out his arms into the cupboard. He +touched something that moved beneath his hand, a stiff, short crop of +hair, the hair of a man's head. He drew his arm away as though an adder +had stung it; he did not utter a cry or make a movement. He stood for a +moment paralysed, and during that moment a strong hand caught him by the +throat. + +Wogan was borne backwards, his assailant sprang at him from the +cupboard, he staggered under the unexpected vigour of the attack, he +clutched his enemy, and the two men came to the ground with a crash. +Even as he fell Wogan thought, "Gaydon would never have overlooked that +cupboard." + +It was the only reflection, however, for which he could afford time. He +was undermost, and the hand at his throat had the grip of a steel glove. +He fought with blows from his fists and his bent knees; he twisted his +legs about the legs of his enemy; he writhed his body if so he might +dislodge him; he grappled wildly for his throat. But all the time his +strength grew less; he felt that his temples were swelling, and it +seemed to him that his eyes must burst. The darkness of the room was +spotted with sparks of fire; the air was filled with a continuous roar +like a million chariots in a street. He saw the face of his chosen +woman, most reproachful and yet kind, gazing at him from behind the bars +which now would never be broken, and then there came a loud banging at +the door. The summons surprised them both, so hotly had they been +engaged, so unaware were they of the noise which their fall had made. + +Wogan felt his assailant's hand relax and heard him say in a low muffled +voice, "It is nothing. Go to bed! I fell over a chair in the dark." + +That momentary relaxation was, he knew, his last chance. He gathered his +strength in a supreme effort, lurched over onto his left side, and +getting his right arm free swung it with all his strength in the +direction of the voice. His clenched fist caught his opponent full under +the point of the chin, and the hand at Wogan's throat clutched once and +fell away limp as an empty glove. Wogan sat up on the floor and drew his +breath. That, after all, was more than his antagonist was doing. The +knocking at the door continued; Wogan could not answer it, he had not +the strength. His limbs were shaking, the sweat clotted his hair and +dripped from his face. But his opponent was quieter still. At last he +managed to gather his legs beneath him, to kneel up, to stand shakily +upon his feet. He could no longer mistake the position of the door; he +tottered across to it, removed the chair, and opened it. + +The landlord with a couple of servants stepped back as Wogan showed +himself to the light of their candles. Wogan heard their exclamations, +though he did not clearly understand them, for his ears still buzzed. He +saw their startled faces, but only dimly, for he was dazzled by the +light. He came back into the room, and pointing to his assailant,--a +sturdy, broad man, who now sat up opening and shutting his eyes in a +dazed way,--"Who is that?" he asked, gasping rather than speaking the +words. + +"Who is that?" repeated the landlord, staring at Wogan. + +"Who is that?" said Wogan, leaning against the bed-post. + +"Why, sir, your servant. Who should he be?" + +Wogan was silent for a little, considering as well as his rambling wits +allowed this new development. + +"Ah!" said Wogan, "he came here with me?" "Yes, since he is your +servant." + +The landlord was evidently mystified; he was no less evidently speaking +with sincerity. Wogan reflected that to proffer a charge against the +assailant would involve his own detention in Ulm. + +"To be sure," said he, "I know. This is my servant. That is precisely +what I mean." His wits were at work to find a way out of his difficulty. +"This is my servant? What then?" he asked fiercely. + +"But I don't understand," said the landlord. + +"You don't understand!" cried Wogan. "Was there ever such a landlord? He +does not understand. This is my servant, I tell you." + +"Yes, sir, but--but--" + +"Well?" + +"We were roused--there was a noise--a noise of men fighting." + +"There would have been no noise," said Wogan, triumphantly, "if you had +prepared a bed for my servant. He would not have crept into my cupboard +to sleep off his drunkenness." + +"But, sir, there was a bed." + +"You should have seen that he was carried to it. As it is, here have I +been driven to beat him and to lose my night's rest in consequence. It +is not fitting. I do not think that your inn is well managed." + +Wogan expressed his indignation with so majestic an air that the +landlord was soon apologising for having disturbed a gentleman in the +proper exercise of belabouring his valet. + +"We will carry the fellow away," said he. + +"You will do nothing of the kind," said Wogan. "He shall get back into +his cupboard and there he shall remain till daybreak. Come, get up!" + +Wogan's self-appointed valet got to his feet. There was no possibility +of an escape for him since there were three men between him and the +door. On the other hand, obedience to Wogan might save him from a charge +of attempted theft. + +"In with you," said Wogan, and the man obeyed. His head no doubt was +still spinning from the blow, and he had the stupid look of one dazed. + +"There is no lock to the door," said the landlord. + +"There is no need of a lock," said Wogan, "so long as one has a chair. +The fellow will do very well till the morning. But I will take your +three candles, for it is not likely that I shall sleep." + +Wogan smoked his pipe all the rest of the night, reclining on a couple +of chairs in front of the cupboard. In the morning he made his valet +walk three miles by his horse's side. The man dared not disobey, and +when Wogan finally let him go he was so far from the town that, had he +confederates there, he could do no harm. + +Wogan continued his journey. Towns, it was proved, were no safer to him +than villages. He began to wonder how it was that no traps had been laid +for him on the earlier stages of his journey, and he suddenly hit upon +the explanation. "It was that night," said he to himself, "when the +Prince sat by the Countess with the list of my friends in his hands. The +names were all erased but three, and against those three was that other +name of Schlestadt. No doubt the Countess while she bent over her +harp-strings took a look at that list. I must run the gauntlet into +Schlestadt." + +Towards evening he came to Stuttgart and rode through the Schloss Platz +and along the Koenigstrasse. Wogan would not sleep there, since there the +Duke of Wuertemberg held his court, and in that court the Countess of +Berg was very likely to have friends. He rode onwards through the valley +along the banks of the Nesen brook until he came to its junction with +the Neckar. + +A mile farther a wooden mill stood upon the river-bank, beyond the mill +was a tavern, and beyond the tavern stood a few cottages. At some +distance from the cottages along the road, Wogan could see a high brick +wall, and over the top the chimneys and the slate roof of a large house. +Wogan stopped at the tavern. It promised no particular comfort, it was a +small dilapidated house; but it had the advantage that it was free from +new paint. It seemed to Wogan, however, wellnigh useless to take +precautions in the choice of a lodging; danger leaped at him from every +quarter. For this last night he must trust to his luck; and besides +there was the splash of the water falling over the mill-dam. It was +always something to Wogan to fall asleep with that sound in his ears. He +dismounted accordingly, and having ordered his supper asked for a room. + +"You will sleep here?" exclaimed his host. + +"I will at all events lie in bed," returned Wogan. + +The innkeeper took a lamp and led the way up a narrow winding stair. + +"Have a care, sir," said he; "the stairs are steep." + +"I prefer them steep." + +"I am afraid that I keep the light from you, but there is no room for +two to walk abreast." + +"It is an advantage. I do not like to be jostled on the stairs." + +The landlord threw open a door at the top of the stairs. + +"The room is a garret," he said in apology. + +"So long as it has no cupboards it will serve my turn." + +"Ah! you do not like cupboards." + +"They fill a poor man with envy of those who have clothes to hang in +them." + +Wogan ascertained that there were no cupboards. There was a key, too, in +the lock, and a chest of drawers which could be moved very suitably in +front of the door. + +"It is a good garret," said Wogan, laying down his bag upon a chair. + +"The window is small," continued the landlord. + +"One will be less likely to fall out," said Wogan. One would also, he +thought, be less likely to climb in. He looked out of the window. It was +a good height from the ground; there was no stanchion or projection in +the wall, and it seemed impossible that a man could get his shoulders +through the opening. Wogan opened the window to try it, and the sound of +someone running came to his ears. + +"Oho!" said he, but he said it to himself, "here's a man in a mighty +hurry." + +A mist was rising from the ground; the evening, too, was dark. Wogan +could see no one in the road below, but he heard the footsteps +diminishing into a faint patter. Then they ceased altogether. The man +who ran was running in the direction of Stuttgart. + +"Yes, your garret will do," said Wogan, in quite a different voice. He +had begun to think that this night he would sleep, and he realised now +that he must not. The man might be running on his own business, but this +was the last night before Wogan would reach his friends. Stuttgart was +only three miles away. He could take no risks, and so he must stay +awake with his sword upon his knees. Had his horse been able to carry +him farther, he would have ridden on, but the horse was even more weary +than its master. Besides, the narrow staircase made his room an +excellent place to defend. + +"Get my supper," said he, "for I am very tired." + +"Will your Excellency sup here?" asked the landlord. + +"By no manner of means," returned Wogan, who had it in his mind to spy +out the land. "I detest nothing so much as my own company." + +He went downstairs into the common room and supped off a smoked ham and +a bottle of execrable wine. While he ate a man came in and sat him down +by the fire. The man had a hot, flushed face, and when he saluted Wogan +he could hardly speak. + +"You have been running," said Wogan, politely. + +"Sir, running is a poor man's overcoat for a chilly evening; besides it +helps me to pay with patience the price of wine for vinegar;" and the +fellow called the landlord. + +Presently two other men entered, and taking a seat by the fire chatted +together as though much absorbed in their private business. These two +men wore swords. + +"You have a good trade," said Wogan to the landlord. + +"The mill brings me custom." + +The door opened as the landlord spoke, and a big loud-voiced man +cheerily wished the company good evening. The two companions at the fire +paid no heed to the civility; the third, who had now quite recovered his +breath, replied to it. Wogan pushed his plate away and called for a +pipe. He thought it might perhaps prove well worth his while to study +his landlord's clients before he retired up those narrow stairs. The +four men gave no sign of any common agreement, nor were they at all +curious as to Wogan. If they spoke at all, they spoke as strangers +speak. But while Wogan was smoking his first pipe a fifth man entered, +and he just gave one quick glance at Wogan. Wogan behind a cloud of +tobacco-smoke saw the movement of the head and detected the look. It +might signify nothing but curiosity, of course, but Wogan felt glad that +the stairs were narrow. He finished his pipe and was knocking out the +ashes when it occurred to him that he had seen that fifth man before; +and Wogan looked at him more carefully, and though the fellow was +disguised by the growth of a beard he recognised him. It was the servant +whom Wogan had seen one day in the Countess of Berg's livery of green +and red galloping along the road to Prague. + +"I know enough now," thought Wogan. "I can go to bed. The staircase is a +pretty place with which we shall all be more familiar in an hour or +two." He laughed quietly to himself with a little thrill of enjoyment. +His fatigue had vanished. He was on the point of getting up from the +table when the two men by the fire looked round towards the last comer +and made room for him upon their settle. But he said, "I find the room +hot, and will stay by the door." + +Wogan changed his mind at the words; he did not get up. On the contrary, +he filled his pipe a second time very thoughtfully. He had stayed too +long in the room, it seemed; the little staircase was, after all, likely +to prove of no service. He did not betray himself by any start or +exclamation, he did not even look up, but bending his head over his pipe +he thought over the disposition of the room. The fireplace was on his +right; the door was opposite to him; the window in the wall at his left. +The window was high from the ground and at some distance. On the other +hand, he had certain advantages. He was in a corner, he had the five men +in front of him, and between them and himself stood a solid table. A +loaded pistol was in his belt, his sword hung at his side, and his +hunting knife at his waist. Still the aspect of affairs was changed. + +"Five men," thought he, "upon a narrow staircase are merely one man who +has to be killed five times, but five men in a room are five +simultaneous assailants. I need O'Toole here, I need O'Toole's six feet +four and the length of his arm and the weight of him--these things I +need--but are there five or only four?" And he was at once aware that +the two men at the fire had ceased to talk of their business. No one, +indeed, was speaking at all, and no one so much as shuffled a foot. +Wogan raised his head and proceeded to light his pipe; and he saw that +all the five men were silently watching him, and it seemed to him that +those five pairs of eyes were unnaturally bright. + +However, he appeared to be entirely concerned with his pipe, which, +however hard he puffed at it, would not draw. No doubt the tobacco was +packed too tight in the bowl. He loosened it, and when he had loosened +it the pipe had gone out. He fumbled in his pocket and discovered in the +breast of his coat a letter. This letter he glanced through to make sure +that it was of no importance, and having informed himself upon the point +he folded it into a long spill and walked over to the hearth. + +The five pairs of eyes followed his movements. He, however, had no +attention to spare. He bent down, lit his spill in the flame, and +deliberately lighted his pipe. The tobacco rose above the rim of the +bowl like a head of ale in a tankard. Wogan, still holding the burning +spill in his right hand, pressed down the tobacco with the little finger +of his left, and lighted the pipe again. By this time his spill had +burned down to his fingers. He dropped the end into the fire and walked +back to his seat. The five pairs of eyes again turned as he turned. He +stumbled at a crack in the floor, fell against the table with a clatter +of his sword, and rolled noisily into his seat. When he sat down a +careful observer might have noticed that his pistol was now at full +cock. + +He had barely seated himself when the polite man, who had come first +hot and short of breath into the room, crossed the floor and leaning +over the table said with a smile and the gentlest voice, "I think, sir, +you ought to know that we are all very poor men." + +"I, too," replied Wogan, "am an Irishman." + +The polite man leaned farther across the table; his voice became +wheedling in its suavity. "I think you ought to know that we are all +very poor men." + +"The repetition of the remark," said Wogan, "argues certainly a poverty +of ideas." + +"We wish to become less poor." + +"It is an aspiration which has pushed many men to creditable feats." + +"You can help us." + +"My prayers are at your disposal," said Wogan. + +"By more than your prayers;" and he added in a tone of apology, "there +are five of us." + +"Then I have a guinea apiece for you," and Wogan thrust the table a +little away from him to search his pockets. It also gave him more play. + +"We do not want your money. You have a letter which we can coin." + +Wogan smiled. + +"There, sir, you are wrong." + +The polite man waved the statement aside. "A letter from Prince +Sobieski," said he. + +"I had such a letter a minute ago, but I lit my pipe with it under your +nose." + +The polite man stepped back; his four companions started to their feet. + +The servant from Ohlau cried out with an oath, "It's a lie." + +Wogan shrugged his shoulders and crossed his legs. + +"Here's a fine world," said he. "A damned rag of a lackey gives a +gentleman the lie." + +"You will give me the letter," said the polite man, coming round the +table. He held his right hand behind his back. + +"You can sweep up the ashes from the hearth," said Wogan, who made no +movement of any kind. The polite man came close to his side; Wogan let +him come. The polite man stretched out his left hand towards Wogan's +pocket. Wogan knocked the hand away, and the man's right arm swung +upwards from behind his back with a gleaming pistol in the hand. Wogan +was prepared for him; he had crossed his legs to be prepared, and as the +arm came round he kicked upwards from the knee. The toe of his heavy +boot caught the man upon the point of the elbow. His arm was flung up; +the pistol exploded and then dropped onto the floor. That assailant was +for the time out of action, but at the same moment the lackey came +running across the floor, his shoulders thrust forward, a knife in his +hand. + +Wogan had just time to notice that the lackey's coat was open at his +breast. He stood up, leaned over the table, caught the lapels one in +each hand as the fellow rushed at him, and lifting the coat up off his +shoulders violently jammed it backwards down his arms as though he would +strip him of it. The lackey stood with his arms pinioned at his elbows +for a second. During that second Wogan drew his hunting knife from his +belt and drove it with a terrible strength into the man's chest. + +"There's a New Year's gift for your mistress, the Countess of Berg," +cried Wogan; and the lackey swung round with the force of the blow and +then hopped twice in a horrible fashion with his feet together across +the room as though returning to his place, and fell upon the floor, +where he lay twisting. + +The polite man was nursing his elbow in a corner; there were three +others left,--the man with the cheery voice, who had no weapon but a +knobbed stick, and the companions on the settle. These two had swords +and had drawn them. They leaped over the lackey's body and rushed at +Wogan one a little in advance of the other. Wogan tilted the heavy table +and flung it over to make a barricade in front of him. It fell with a +crash, and the lower rim struck upon the instep of the leader and pinned +his foot. His companion drew back; he himself uttered a cry and wrenched +at his foot. Wogan with his left hand drew his sword from the scabbard, +and with the same movement passed it through his opponent's body. The +man stood swaying, pinned there by his foot and held erect. Then he made +one desperate lunge, fell forward across the barricade, and hung there. +Wogan parried the lunge; the sword fell from the man's hand and +clattered onto the floor within the barricade. Wogan stamped upon it +with his heel and snapped the blade. He had still two opponents; and as +they advanced again he suddenly sprung onto the edge of the table, gave +one sweeping cut in a circle with his sword, and darted across the room. +The two men gave ground; Wogan passed between them. Before they could +strike at his back he was facing them again. He had no longer his +barricade, but on the other hand his shoulders were against the door. + +The swordsman crossed blades with him, and at the first pass Wogan +realised with dismay that his enemy was a swordsman in knowledge as well +as in the possession of the weapon. He had a fencer's suppleness of +wrist and balance of body; he pressed Wogan hard and without flurry. The +blade of his sword made glittering rings about Wogan's, and the point +struck at his breast like an adder. + +Wogan was engaged with his equal if not with his better. He was fighting +for his life with one man, and he would have to fight for it with two, +nay, with three. For over his opponent's shoulder he saw his first +polite antagonist cross to the table and pick up from the ground the +broken sword. One small consolation Wogan had; the fellow picked it up +with his left hand, his right elbow was still useless. But even that +consolation lasted him for no long time, for out of the tail of his eye +he could see the big fellow creeping up with his stick raised along the +wall at his right. + +Wogan suddenly pressed upon his opponent, delivering thrust upon thrust, +and forced him to give ground. As the swordsman drew back, Wogan swept +his weapon round and slashed at the man upon his right. But the stroke +was wide of its mark, and the big man struck at the sword with his +stick, struck with all his might, so that Wogan's arm tingled from the +wrist to the shoulder. That, however, was the least part of the damage +the stick did. It broke Wogan's sword short off at the hilt. + +Both men gave a cry of delight. Wogan dropped the hilt. + +"I have a loaded pistol, my friends; you have forgotten that," he cried, +and plucked the pistol from his belt. At the same moment he felt behind +him with his left hand for the knob of the door. He fired at the +swordsman and his pistol missed, he flung it at the man with the stick, +and as he flung it he sprang to the right, threw open the door, darted +into the passage, and slammed the door to. + +It was the work of a second. The men sprang at him as he opened the +door; as he slammed it close a sword-point pierced the thin panel and +bit like a searing iron into his shoulder. Wogan uttered a cry; he heard +an answering shout in the room, he clung to the handle, setting his foot +against the wall, and was then stabbed in the back. For his host was +waiting for him in the passage. + +Wogan dropped the door-handle and turned. That last blow had thrown him +into a violent rage. Possessed by rage, he was no longer conscious of +wounds or danger; he was conscious only of superhuman strength. The +knife was already lifted to strike again. Wogan seized the wrist which +held the knife, grappled with the innkeeper, and caught him about the +body. The door of the room, now behind him, was flung violently open. +Wogan, who was wrought to a frenzy, lifted up the man he wrestled with, +and swinging round hurled him headlong through the doorway. The three +men were already on the threshold. The new missile bounded against them, +tumbled them one against the other, and knocked them sprawling and +struggling on the floor. + +Wogan burst into a laugh of exultation; he saw his most dangerous enemy +striving to disentangle himself and his sword. + +"Aha, my friend," he cried, "you handle a sword very prettily, but I am +the better man at cock-shies." And shutting the door to be ran down the +passage into the road. + +He had seen a house that afternoon with a high garden wall about it a +quarter of a mile away. Wogan ran towards it. The mist was still thick, +but he now began to feel his strength failing. He was wounded in the +shoulder, he was stabbed in the back, and from both wounds the blood was +flowing warm. Moreover, he looked backwards once over his shoulder and +saw a lantern dancing in the road. He kept doggedly running, though his +pace slackened; he heard a shout and an answering shout behind him. He +stumbled onto his knees, picked himself up, and staggered on, labouring +his breath, dizzy. He stumbled again and fell, but as he fell he struck +against the sharp corner of the wall. If he could find an entrance into +the garden beyond that wall! He turned off the road to the left and ran +across a field, keeping close along the side of the wall. He came to +another corner and turned to the right. As he turned he heard voices in +the road. The pursuers had stopped and were searching with the lantern +for traces of his passage. He ran along the back of the wall, feeling +for a projection, a tree, anything which would enable him to climb it. +The wall was smooth, and though the branches of trees swung and creaked +above his head, their stems grew in the garden upon the other side. He +was pouring with sweat, his breath whistled, in his ears he had the +sound of innumerable armies marching across the earth, but he stumbled +on. And at last, though his right side brushed against the wall, he none +the less struck against it also with his chest. He was too dazed for the +moment to understand what had happened; all the breath he had left was +knocked clean out of his body; he dropped in a huddle on the ground. + +In a little he recovered his breath; he listened and could no longer +hear any sound of voices; he began to consider. He reached a hand out in +front of him and touched the wall; he reached out a hand to the right of +him and touched the wall again. The wall projected then abruptly and +made a right angle. + +Now Wogan had spent his boyhood at Rathcoffey among cliffs and rocks. +This wall, he reflected, could not be more than twelve feet high. Would +his strength last out? He came to the conclusion that it must. + +He took off his heavy boots and flung them one by one over the wall. +Then he pulled off his coat at the cost of some pain and an added +weakness, for the coat was stuck to his wounds and had roughly staunched +them. He could feel the blood again soaking his shirt. There was all the +more need, then, for hurry. He stood up, jammed his back into the angle +of the wall, stretched out his arms on each side, pressing with his +elbows and hands, and then bending his knees crossed his legs tailor +fashion, and set the soles of his stockinged feet firmly against the +bricks on each side. He was thus seated as it were upon nothing, but +retaining his position by the pressure of his arms and feet and his +whole body. Still retaining this position, very slowly, very +laboriously, he worked himself up the angle, stopping now and then to +regain his breath, now and then slipping back an inch. But he mounted +towards the top, and after a while the back of his head no longer +touched the bricks. His head was above the coping of the wall. + +It was at this moment that he saw the lantern again, just at the corner +where he had turned. The lantern advanced slowly; it was now held aloft, +now close to the ground. Wogan was very glad he had thrown his boots +and coat into the garden. He made a few last desperate struggles; he +could now place the palms of his hands behind him upon the coping, and +he hoisted himself up and sat on the wall. + +The lantern was nearer to him; he lay flat upon his face on the coping, +and then lowering himself upon the garden side to the full length of his +arms, he let go. He fell into a litter of dead leaves, very soft and +comfortable. He would not have exchanged them at that moment for the +Emperor's own bed. He lay upon his back and saw the dark branches above +his head grow bright and green. His pursuers were flashing their lantern +on the other side; there was only the thickness of the wall between him +and them. He could even hear them whispering and the brushing of their +feet. He lay still as a mouse; and then the earth heaved up and fell +away altogether beneath him. Wogan had fainted. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +It was still night when Wogan opened his eyes, but the night was now +clear of mist. There was no moon, however, to give him a guess at the +hour. He lay upon his back among the dead leaves, and looking upwards at +the stars, caught as it seemed in a lattice-work of branches, floated +back into consciousness. He moved, and the movement turned him sick with +pain. The knowledge of his wounds came to him and brought with it a +clear recollection of the last three nights. The ever-widening black +strip in the door on the first night, the clutch at his throat and the +leap from the cupboard on the second, the silent watching of those five +pairs of eyes on the third, and the lackey with the knife in his breast +hopping with both feet horribly across the floor,--the horror of these +recollections swept in upon him and changed him from a man into a +timorous child. He lay and shuddered until in every creak of the +branches he heard the whisper of an enemy, in every flutter of leaves +across the lawn a stealthy footstep, and behind every tree-stem he +caught the flap of a cloak. + +Stiff and sore, he raised himself from the ground, he groped for his +boots and coat, and putting them on moved cautiously through the trees, +supporting himself from stem to stem. He came to the borders of a wide, +smooth lawn, and on the farther side stood the house,--a long, +two-storeyed house with level tiers of windows stretching to the right +and the left, and a bowed tower in the middle. Through one of the +windows in the ground-floor Wogan saw the spark of a lamp, and about +that window a fan of yellow light was spread upon the lawn. + +Wogan at this moment felt in great need of companionship. He stole +across the lawn and looked into the room. An old gentleman with a +delicate face, who wore his own white hair, was bending over a book at a +desk. The room was warmly furnished, the door of the stove stood open, +and Wogan could see the logs blazing merrily. A chill wind swept across +the lawn, very drear and ghostly. Wogan crept closer to the window. A +great boar-hound rose at the old man's feet and growled; then the old +man rose, and crossing to the window pressed his face against the panes +with his hands curved about his eyes. Wogan stepped forward and stood +within the fan of light, spreading out his arms to show that he came as +a supplicant and with no ill intent. + +The old man, with a word to his hound, opened the window. + +"Who is it?" he asked, and with a thrill not of fear but of expectation +in his voice. + +"A man wounded and in sore straits for his life, who would gladly sit +for a few minutes by your fire before he goes upon his way." + +The old man stood aside, and Wogan entered the room. He was spattered +from head to foot with mud, his clothes were torn, his eyes sunken, his +face was of a ghastly pallor and marked with blood. + +"I am the Chevalier Warner," said Wogan, "a gentleman of Ireland. You +will pardon me. But I have gone through so much these last three nights +that I can barely stand;" and dropping into a chair he dragged it up to +the door of the stove, and crouched there shivering. + +The old man closed the window. + +"I am Count Otto von Ahlen, and in my house you are safe as you are +welcome." + +He went to a sideboard, and filling a glass carried it to Wogan. The +liquor was brandy. Wogan drank it as though it had been so much water. +He was in that condition of fatigue when the most extraordinary events +seem altogether commonplace and natural. But as he felt the spirit +warming his blood, he became aware of the great difference between his +battered appearance and that of the old gentleman with the rich dress +and the white linen who stooped so hospitably above him, and he began to +wonder at the readiness of the hospitality. Wogan might have been a +thief, a murderer, for all Count Otto knew. Yet the Count, with no other +protection than his dog, had opened his window, and at that late hour of +the night had welcomed him without a word of a question. + +"Sir," said Wogan, "my visit is the most unceremonious thing in the +world. I plump in upon you in the dark of the morning, as I take it to +be, and disturb you at your books without so much as knocking at the +door." + +"It is as well you did not knock at the door," returned the Count, "for +my servants are long since in bed, and your knock would very likely have +reached neither their ears nor mine." And he drew up a chair and sat +down opposite to Wogan, bending forward with his hands upon his knees. +The firelight played upon his pale, indoor face, and it seemed to Wogan +that he regarded his guest with a certain wistfulness. Wogan spoke his +thought aloud,-- + +"Yet I might be any hedgerow rascal with a taste for your plate, and no +particular scruples as to a life or two lying in the way of its +gratification." + +The Count smiled. + +"Your visit is not so unexampled as you are inclined to think. Nearly +thirty years ago a young man as you are came in just such a plight as +you and stood outside this window at two o'clock of a dark morning. Even +so early in my life I was at my books," and he smiled rather sadly. "I +let him in and he talked to me for an hour of matters strange and +dreamlike, and enviable to me. I have never forgotten that hour, nor to +tell the truth have I ever ceased to envy the man who talked to me +during it, though many years since he suffered a dreadful doom and +vanished from among his fellows. I shall be glad, therefore, to hear +your story if you have a mind to tell it me. The young man who came +upon that other night was Count Philip Christopher von Koenigsmarck." + +Wogan started at the mention of this name. It seemed strange that that +fitful and brilliant man, whose brief, passionate, guilty life and +mysterious end had made so much noise in the world, had crossed that +lawn and stood before that window at just such an hour, and maybe had +sat shivering in Wogan's very chair. + +"I have no such story as Count Philip von Koenigsmarck no doubt had to +tell," said Wogan. + +"Chevalier," said Count Otto, with a nod of approval, "Koenigsmarck had +the like reticence, though he was not always so discreet, I fear. The +Princess Sophia Dorothea was at that time on a visit to the Duke of +Wuertemberg at the palace in Stuttgart, but Koenigsmarck told me only that +he had snatched a breathing space from the wars in the Low Countries and +was bound thither again. Rumour told me afterwards of his fatal +attachment. He sat where you sit, Chevalier, wounded as you are, a +fugitive from pursuit. Even the stains and disorder of his plight could +not disguise the singular beauty of the man or make one insensible to +the charm of his manner. But I forget my duties," and he rose. "It would +be as well, no doubt, if I did not wake my servants?" he suggested. + +"Count Otto," returned Wogan, with a smile, "they have their day's work +to-morrow." + +The old man nodded, and taking a lamp from a table by the door went out +of the room. + +Wogan remained alone; the dog nuzzled at his hand; but it seemed to +Wogan that there was another in the room besides himself and the dog. +The sleeplessness and tension of the last few days, the fatigue of his +arduous journey, the fever of his wounds, no doubt, had their effect +upon him. He felt that Koenigsmarck was at his side; his eyes could +almost discern a shadowy and beautiful figure; his ears could almost +hear a musical vibrating voice. And the voice warned him,--in some +strange unaccountable way the voice warned and menaced him. + +"I fought, I climbed that wall, I crossed the lawn, I took refuge here +for love of a queen. For love of a queen all my short life I lived. For +love of a queen I died most horribly; and the queen lives, though it +would have gone better with her had she died as horribly." + +Wogan had once seen the lonely castle of Ahlden where that queen was +imprisoned; he had once caught a glimpse of her driving in the dusk +across the heath surrounded by her guards with their flashing swords. + +He sat chilled with apprehensions and forebodings. They crowded in upon +his mind all the more terrible because he could not translate them into +definite perils which beyond this and that corner of his life might +await him. He was the victim of illusions, he assured himself, at which +to-morrow safe in Schlestadt he would laugh. But to-night the illusions +were real. Koenigsmarck was with him. Koenigsmarck was by some mysterious +alchemy becoming incorporate with him. The voice which spoke and warned +and menaced was as much his as Koenigsmarck's. + +The old Count opened the door and heard Wogan muttering to himself as he +crouched over the fire. The Count carried a basin of water in his hand +and a sponge and some linen. He insisted upon washing Wogan's wounds and +dressing them in a simple way. + +"They are not deep," he said; "a few days' rest and a clever surgeon +will restore you." He went from the room again and brought back a tray, +on which were the remains of a pie, a loaf of bread, and some fruit. + +"While you eat, Chevalier, I will mix you a cordial," said he, and he +set about his hospitable work. "You ask me why I so readily opened my +window to you. It was because I took you for Koenigsmarck himself come +back as mysteriously as he disappeared. I did not think that if he came +back now his hair would be as white, his shoulders as bent, as mine. +Indeed, one cannot think of Koenigsmarck except as a youth. You had the +very look of him as you stood in the light upon the lawn. You have, if I +may say so, something of his gallant bearing and something of his +grace." + +Wogan could have heard no words more distressing to him at this moment. + +"Oh, stop, sir. I pray you stop!" he cried out violently, and noting the +instant he had spoken the surprise on Count Otto's face. "There, sir, I +give you at once by my discourtesy an example of how little I merit a +comparison with that courtly nobleman. Let me repair it by telling you, +since you are willing to hear, of my night's adventure." And as he ate +he told his story, omitting the precise object of his journey, the +nature of the letter which he had burned, and any name which might give +a clue to the secret of his enterprise. + +The Count Otto listened with his eyes as well as his ears; he hung upon +the words, shuddering at each danger that sprang upon Wogan, exclaiming +in wonder at the shift by which he escaped from it, and at times he +looked over towards his books with a glance of veritable dislike. + +"To feel the blood run hot in one's veins, to be bedfellows with peril, +to go gallantly forward hand in hand with endeavour," he mused and broke +off. "See, I own a sword, being a gentleman. But it is a toy, an +ornament; it stands over there in the corner from day to day, and my +servants clean it from rust as they will. Now you, sir, I suppose--" + +"My horse and my sword, Count," said Wogan, "when the pinch comes, they +are one's only servants. It would be an ill business if I did not see to +their wants." + +The old man was silent for a while. Then he said timidly, "It was for a +woman, no doubt, that you ran this hazard to-night?" + +"For a woman, yes." + +The Count folded his hands and leaned forward. + +"Sir, a woman is a strange inexplicable thing to me. Their words, their +looks, their graceful, delicate shapes, the motives which persuade them, +the thoughts which their eyes conceal,--all these qualities make them +beings of another world to me. I do envy men at times who can stand +beside them, talk with them without fear, be intimate with them, and +understand their intricate thoughts." + +"Are there such men?" asked Wogan. + +"Men who love, such as Count Koenigsmarck and yourself." + +Wogan held up his hand with a cry. + +"Count, such men, we are told, are the blindest of all. Did not +Koenigsmarck prove it? As for myself, not even in that respect can I be +ranked with Koenigsmarck. I am a mere man-at-arms, whose love-making is a +clash of steel." + +"But to-night--this risk you ran; you told me it was for a woman." + +"For a woman, yes. For love of a woman, no, no, no!" he exclaimed with +surprising violence. Then he rose from his chair. + +"But I have stayed my time," said he, "you have never had a more +grateful guest. I beg you to believe it." + +Count Otto barely heard the words. He was absorbed in the fanciful +dreams born of many long solitary evenings, and like most timid and +uncommunicative men he made his confidence in a momentary enthusiasm to +a stranger. + +"Koenigsmarck spoke for an hour, mentioning no names, so that I who from +my youth have lived apart could not make a guess. He spoke with a deal +of passion; it seemed that one hour his life was paradise and the next a +hell. Even as he spoke he was one instant all faith and the next all +despair. One moment he was filled with his unworthiness and wonder that +so noble a creature as a woman should bend her heart and lips from her +heaven down to his earth. The next he could not conceive any man should +be such a witless ass as to stake his happiness on the steadiness of so +manifest a weathercock as a woman's favour. It was all very strange +talk; it opened to me, just as when a fog lifts and rolls down again, a +momentary vision of a world of colours in which I had no share; and to +tell the truth it left me with a suspicion which has recurred again and +again, that all my solitary years over my books, all the delights which +the delicate turning of a phrase, or the chase and capture of an elusive +idea, can bring to one may not be worth, after all, one single minute of +living passion. Passion, Chevalier! There is a word of which I know the +meaning only by hearsay. But I wonder at times, whatever harm it works, +whether there can be any great thing without it. But you are anxious to +go forward upon your way." + +He again took up his lamp, and requesting Wogan to follow him, unlatched +the window. Wogan, however, did not move. + +"I am wondering," said he, "whether I might be yet deeper in your debt. +I left behind me a sword." + +Count Otto set his lamp down and took a sword from the corner of the +room. + +"I called it an ornament, and yet in other hands it might well prove a +serviceable weapon. The blade is of Spanish steel. You will honour me by +wearing it." + +Wogan was in two minds with regard to the Count. On the one hand, he was +most grateful; on the other he could not but think that over his books +he had fallen into a sickly way of thought. He was quite ready, however, +to wear his sword; moreover, when he had hooked the hanger to his belt +he looked about the room. + +"I had a pistol," he said carelessly, "a very useful thing is a pistol, +more useful at times than a sword." + +"I keep one in my bedroom," said the Count, setting the lamp down, "if +you can wait the few moments it will take me to fetch it." + +Mr. Wogan was quite able to wait. He was indeed sufficiently generous to +tell Count Otto that he need not hurry. The Count fetched the pistol and +took up the lamp again. + +"Will you now follow me?" + +Wogan looked straight before him into the air and spoke to no one in +particular. + +"A pistol is, to be sure, more useful than a sword; but there is just +one thing more useful on an occasion than a pistol, and that is a +hunting knife." + +Count Otto shook his head. + +"There, Chevalier, I doubt if I can serve you." + +"But upon my word," said Wogan, picking up a carving-knife from the +tray, "here is the very thing." + +"It has no sheath." + +Wogan was almost indignant at the suggestion that he would go so far as +to ask even his dearest friend for a sheath. Besides, he had a sheath, +and he fitted the knife into it. + +"Now," said he, pleasantly, "all that I need is a sound, swift, +thoroughbred horse about six or seven years old." + +Count Otto for the fourth time took up his lamp. + +"Will you follow me?" he said for the fourth time. + +Wogan followed the old man across the lawn and round a corner of the +house until he came to a long, low building surmounted by a cupola. The +building was the stable, and the Count Otto roused one of his grooms. + +"Saddle me Flavia," said he. "Flavia is a mare who, I fancy, fulfils +your requirements." + +Wogan had no complaint to make of her. She had the manners of a +courtier. It seemed, too, that she had no complaint to make of Mr. +Wogan. Count Otto laid his hand upon the bridle and led the mare with +her rider along a lane through a thicket of trees and to a small gate. + +"Here, then, we part, Chevalier," said he. "No doubt to-morrow I shall +sit down at my table, knowing that I talked a deal of folly ill +befitting an old man. No doubt I shall be aware that my books are the +true happiness after all. But to-night--well, to-night I would fain be +twenty years of age, that I might fling my books over the hedge and ride +out with you, my sword at my side, my courage in my hand, into the +world's highway. I will beg you to keep the mare as a token and a memory +of our meeting. There is no better beast, I believe, in Christendom." + +Wogan was touched by the old gentleman's warmth. + +"Count," said Wogan, "I will gladly keep your mare in remembrance of +your great goodwill to a stranger. But there is one better beast in +Christendom." + +"Indeed? And which is that?" + +"Why, sir, the black horse which the lady I shall marry will ride into +my city of dreams." And so he rode off upon his way. The morning was +just beginning to gleam pale in the east. Here was a night passed which +he had not thought to live through, and he was still alive to help the +chosen woman imprisoned in the hollow of the hills at Innspruck. Wogan +had reason to be grateful to that old man who stood straining his eyes +after him. There was something pathetical in his discontent with his +secluded life which touched Wogan to the heart. Wogan was not sure that +in the morning the old man would know that the part he had chosen was, +after all, the best. Besides, Wogan had between his knees the most +friendly and intelligent beast which he had ridden since that morning +when he met Lady Featherstone on the road to Bologna. But he had soon +other matters to distract his thoughts. However easily Flavia cantered +or trotted she could not but sharply remind him of his wounds. He had +forty miles to travel before he could reach Schlestadt; and in the +villages on the road there was gossip that day of a man with a tormented +face who rode rocking in his saddle as though the furies were at his +back. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +The little town of Schlestadt went to bed betimes. By ten o'clock its +burghers were in their night-caps. A belated visitor going home at that +hour found his footsteps ring upon the pavement with surprising echoes, +and traversed dark street after dark street, seeing in each window, +perhaps, a mimic moon, but no other light unless his path chanced to lie +through Herzogstrasse. In that street a couple of windows on the first +floor showed bright and unabashed, and the curious passer-by could +detect upon the blind the shadows of men growing to monstrous giants and +dwindling to pigmies according as they approached or retired from the +lamp in the room. + +There were three men in that room booted as for a journey. Their dress +might have misled one into the belief that they were merchants, but +their manner of wearing it proclaimed them soldiers. Of the three, one, +a short, spare man, sat at the table with his head bent over a slip of +paper. His peruke was pushed back from his forehead and showed that the +hair about his temples was grey. He had a square face of some strength, +and thoughtful eyes. + +The second of the three stood by the window. He was, perhaps, a few +years younger, thirty-six an observer might have guessed to the other's +forty, and his face revealed a character quite different. His features +were sharp, his eyes quick; if prudence was the predominating quality of +the first, resource took its place in the second. While the first man +sat patiently at the table, this one stood impatiently at the window. +Now he lifted the blind, now he dropped it again. + +The third sat in front of the fire with his face upturned to the +ceiling. He was a tall, big man with mighty legs which sprawled one on +each side of the hearth. He was the youngest of the three by five years, +but his forehead at this moment was so creased, his mouth so pursed up, +his cheeks so wrinkled, he had the look of sixty years. He puffed and +breathed very heavily; once or twice he sighed, and at each sigh his +chair creaked under him. Major O'Toole of Dillon's regiment was +thinking. + +"Gaydon," said he, suddenly. + +The man at the table looked up quickly. + +"Misset." + +The man at the window turned impatiently. + +"I have an idea." + +Misset shrugged his shoulders. + +Gaydon said, "Let us hear it." + +O'Toole drew himself up; his chair no longer creaked, it groaned and +cracked. + +"It is a lottery," said he, "and we have made our fortunes. We three are +the winners, and so our names are not crossed out." + +"But I have put no money in a lottery," objected Gaydon. + +"Nor I," said Misset. + +"And where should I find money either?" said O'Toole. "But Charles Wogan +has borrowed it for us and paid it in, and so we're all rich men. +What'll I buy with it?" + +Misset paced the room. + +"The paper came four days ago?" he said. + +"Yes, in the morning." + +"Five days, then," and he stood listening. Then he ran to the window and +opened it. Gaydon followed him and drew up the blind. Both men listened +and were puzzled. + +"That's the sound of horseshoes," said Gaydon. + +"But there's another sound keeping pace with the horseshoes," said +Misset. + +O'Toole leaned on their shoulders, crushing them both down upon the sill +of the window. + +"It is very like the sound a gentleman makes when he reels home from a +tavern." + +Gaydon and Misset raised themselves with a common effort springing from +a common thought and shot O'Toole back into the room. + +"What if it is?" began Misset. + +"He was never drunk in his life," said Gaydon. + +"It's possible that he has reformed," said O'Toole; and the three men +precipitated themselves down the stairs. + +The drunkard was Wogan; he was drunk with fatigue and sleeplessness and +pain, but he had retained just enough of his sober nature to spare a +tired mare who had that day served him well. + +The first intimation he received that his friends were on the watch was +O'Toole's voice bawling down the street to him. + +"Is it a lottery? Tell me we're all rich men," and he felt himself +grasped in O'Toole's arms. + +"I'll tell you more wonderful things than that," stammered Wogan, "when +you have shown me the way to a stable." + +"There's one at the back of the house," said Gaydon. "I'll take the +horse." + +"No," said Wogan, stubbornly, and would not yield the bridle to Gaydon. + +O'Toole nodded approval. + +"There are two things," said he, "a man never trusts to his friends. +One's his horse; t' other's his wife." + +Wogan suddenly stopped and looked at O'Toole. O'Toole answered the look +loftily. + +"It is a little maxim of philosophy. I have others. They come to me in +the night." + +Misset laughed. Wogan walked on to the stable. It was a long building, +and a light was still burning. Moreover, a groom was awake, for the door +was opened before they had come near enough to knock. There were twelve +stalls, of which nine were occupied, and three of the nine horses stood +ready saddled and bridled. + +Wogan sat down upon a corn-bin and waited while his mare was groomed and +fed. The mare looked round once or twice in the midst of her meal, +twisting her neck as far as her halter allowed. + +"I am not gone yet, my lady," said he, "take your time." + +Wogan made a ghostly figure in the dim shadowy light. His face was of an +extraordinary pallor; his teeth chattered; his eyes burned. Gaydon +looked at him with concern and said to the groom, "You can take the +saddles off. We shall need no horses to-night." + +The four men returned to the house. Wogan went upstairs first. Gaydon +held back the other two at the foot of the stairs. + +"Not a word, not a question, till he has eaten, or we shall have him in +bed for a twelvemonth. Misset, do you run for a doctor. O'Toole, see +what you can find in the larder." + +Wogan sat before the fire without a word while O'Toole spread the table +and set a couple of cold partridges upon it and a bottle of red wine. +Wogan ate mechanically for a little and afterwards with some enjoyment. +He picked the partridges till the bones were clean, and he finished the +bottle of wine. Then he rose to his feet with a sigh of something very +like to contentment and felt along the mantel-shelf with his hands. +O'Toole, however, had foreseen his wants and handed him a pipe newly +filled. While Wogan was lighting the tobacco, Misset came back into the +room with word that the doctor was out upon his last rounds, but would +come as soon as he had returned home. The four men sat down about the +fire, and Wogan reached out his hand and felt O'Toole's arm. + +"It is you," he said. "There you are, the three of you, my good friends, +and this is Schlestadt. But it is strange," and he laughed a little to +himself and looked about the room, assuring himself that this indeed was +Gaydon's lodging. + +"You received a slip of paper?" said he. + +"Four days back," said Gaydon. + +"And understood?" + +"That we were to be ready." + +"Good." + +"Then it's not a lottery," murmured O'Toole, "and we've drawn no +prizes." + +"Ah, but we are going to," cried Wogan. "We are safe here. No one can +hear us; no one can burst in. But I am sure of that. Misset knows the +trick that will make us safe from interruption, eh?" + +Misset looked blankly at Wogan. + +"Why, one can turn the key," said he. + +"To be sure," said Wogan, with a laugh of admiration for that device of +which he had bethought himself, and which he ascribed to Misset, "if +there's a key; but if there's no key, why, a chair tilted against the +door to catch the handle, eh?" + +Misset locked the door, not at all comprehending that device, and +returned to his seat. + +"We are to draw the greatest prize that ever was drawn," resumed Wogan, +and he broke off. + +"But is there a cupboard in the room? No matter; I forgot that this is +Gaydon's lodging, and Gaydon's not the man to overlook a cupboard." + +Gaydon jumped up from his chair. + +"But upon my word there is a cupboard," he cried, and crossing to a +corner of the room he opened a door and looked in. Wogan laughed again +as though Gaydon's examination of the cupboard was a very good joke. + +"There will be nobody in it," he cried. "Gaydon will never feel a hand +gripping the life out of his throat because he forgot to search a +cupboard." + +The cupboard was empty, as it happened. But Gaydon had left the door of +the street open when he went out to meet Wogan; there had been time and +to spare for any man to creep upstairs and hide himself had there been a +man in Schlestadt that night minded to hear. Gaydon returned to his +chair. + +"We are to draw the biggest prize in all Europe," said Wogan. + +"There!" cried O'Toole. "Will you be pleased to remember when next I +have an idea that I was right?" + +"But not for ourselves," added Wogan. + +O'Toole's face fell. + +"Oh, we are to hand it on to a third party," said he. + +"Yes." + +"Well, after all, that's quite of a piece with our luck." + +"Who is the third party?" asked Misset. + +"The King." + +Misset started up from his chair and leaned forward, his hands upon the +arms. + +"The King," said O'Toole; "to be sure, that makes a difference." + +Gaydon asked quietly, "And what is the prize?" + +"The Princess Clementina," said Wogan. "We are to rescue her from her +prison in Innspruck." + +Even Gaydon was startled. + +"We four!" he exclaimed. + +"We four!" repeated Misset, staring at Wogan. His mouth was open; his +eyes started from his head; he stammered in his speech. "We four against +a nation, against half Europe!" + +O'Toole simply crossed to a corner of the room, picked up his sword and +buckled it to his waist. + +"I am ready," said he. + +Wogan turned round in his chair and smiled. + +"I know that," said he. "So are we all--all ready; is not that so, my +friends? We four are ready." And he looked to Misset and to Gaydon. +"Here's an exploit, if we but carry it through, which even antiquity +will be at pains to match! It's more than an exploit, for it has the +sanctity of a crusade. On the one side there's tyranny, oppression, +injustice, the one woman who most deserves a crown robbed of it. And on +the other--" + +"There's the King," said Gaydon; and the three brief words seemed +somehow to quench and sober Wogan. + +"Yes," said he; "there's the King, and we four to serve him in his +need. We are few, but in that lies our one hope. They will never look +for four men, but for many. Four men travelling to the shrine of Loretto +with the Pope's passport may well stay at Innspruck and escape a close +attention." + +"I am ready," O'Toole repeated. + +"But we shall not start to-night. There's the passport to be got, a plan +to be arranged." + +"Oh, there's a plan," said O'Toole. "To be sure, there's always a plan." +And he sat down again heavily, as though he put no faith in plans. + +Misset and Gaydon drew their chairs closer to Wogan's and instinctively +lowered their voices to the tone of a whisper. + +"Is her Highness warned of the attempt?" asked Gaydon. + +"As soon as I obtained the King's permission," replied Wogan, "I hurried +to Innspruck. There I saw Chateaudoux, the chamberlain of the Princess's +mother. Here is a letter he dropped in the cathedral for me to pick up." + +He drew the letter from his fob and handed it to Gaydon. Gaydon read it +and handed it to Misset. Misset nodded and handed it to O'Toole, who +read it four times and handed it back to Gaydon with a flourish of the +hand as though the matter was now quite plain to him. + +"Chateaudoux has a sweetheart," said he, sententiously. "Very good; I do +not think the worse of him." + +Gaydon glanced a second time through the letter. + +"The Princess says that you must have the Prince Sobieski's written +consent." + +"I went from Innspruck to Ohlau," said Wogan. "I had some trouble, and +the reason of my coming leaked out. The Countess de Berg suspected it +from the first. She had a friend, an Englishwoman, Lady Featherstone, +who was at Ohlau to outwit me." + +"Lady Featherstone!" said Misset. "Who can she be?" + +Wogan told them of his first meeting with Lady Featherstone on the +Florence road, but he knew no more about her, and not one of the three +knew anything at all. + +"So the secret's out," said Gaydon. "But you outstripped it." + +"Barely," said Wogan. "Forty miles away I had last night to fight for my +life." + +"But you have the Prince's written consent?" said Misset. + +"I had last night, but I made a spill of it to light my pipe. There were +six men against me. Had that been found on my dead body, why, there was +proof positive of our attempt, and the attempt foiled by sure +safeguards. As it is, if we lie still a little while, their fears will +cease and the rumour become discredited." + +Misset leaned across Gaydon's arm and scanned the letter. + +"But her Highness writes most clearly she will not move without that +sure token of her father's consent." + +Wogan drew from his breast pocket a snuff-box made from a single +turquoise. + +"Here's a token no less sure. It was Prince Sobieski's New Year's gift +to me,--a jewel unique and in an unique setting. This must persuade her. +His father, great King John of Poland, took it from the Grand Vizier's +tent when the Turks were routed at Vienna." + +O'Toole reached out his hand and engulfed the jewel. + +"Sure," said he, "it is a pretty sort of toy. It would persuade any +woman to anything so long as she was promised it to hang about her neck. +You must promise it to the Princess, but not give it to her--no, lest +when she has got it she should be content to remain in Innspruck. I +know. You must promise it." + +Wogan bowed to O'Toole's wisdom and took back the snuff-box. "I will not +forget to promise it," said he. + +"But here's another point," said Gaydon. "Her Highness, the Princess's +mother, insists that a woman shall attend upon her daughter, and where +shall we find a woman with the courage and the strength?" + +"I have thought of that," said Wogan. "Misset has a wife. By the +luckiest stroke in the world Misset took a wife this last spring." + +There was at once a complete silence. Gaydon stared into the fire, +O'Toole looked with intense interest at the ceiling, Misset buried his +face in his hands. Wogan was filled with consternation. Was Misset's +wife dead? he asked himself. He had spoken lightly, laughingly, and he +went hot and cold as he recollected the raillery of his words. He sat in +his chair shocked at the pain which he had caused his friend. Moreover, +he had counted surely upon Mrs. Misset. + +Then Misset raised his head from his hands and in a trembling voice he +said slowly, "My boy would only live to serve his King. Why should he +not serve his King before he lives? My wife will say the like." + +There was a depth of quiet feeling in his words which Wogan would never +have expected from Misset; and the words themselves were words which he +felt no man, no king, however much beloved, however generous to his +servants, had any right to expect. They took Wogan's breath away, and +not Wogan's only, but Gaydon's and O'Toole's, too. A longer silence than +before followed upon them. The very simplicity with which they had been +uttered was startling, and made those three men doubt at the first +whether they had heard aright. + +O'Toole was the first to break the silence. + +"It is a strange thing that there never was a father since Adam who was +not absolutely sure in his heart that his first-born must be a boy. When +you come to think philosophically about it, you'll see that if fathers +had their way the world would be peopled with sons with never a bit of +a lass in any corner to marry them." + +O'Toole's reflection, if not a reason for laughter, made a pretext for +it, at which all--even Misset, who was a trifle ashamed of his display +of feeling--eagerly caught. Wogan held his hand out and clasped +Misset's. + +"That was a great saying," said he, "but so much sacrifice is not to be +accepted." + +Misset, however, was firm. His wife, he said, though naturally timid, +could show a fine spirit on occasion, and would never forgive one of +them if she was left behind. He argued until a compromise was reached. +Misset should lay the matter openly before his wife, and the four +crusaders, to use Wogan's term, would be bound by her decision. + +"So you may take it that matter's settled," said Misset. "There will be +five of us." + +"Six," said Wogan. + +"There's another man to join us, then," said Gaydon. "I have it. Your +servant, Marnier." + +"No, not Marnier, nor any man. Listen. It is necessary that when once +her Highness is rescued we must get so much start as will make pursuit +vain. We shall be hampered with a coach, and a coach will travel slowly +on the passes of Tyrol. The pursuers will ride horses; they must not +come up with us. From Innspruck to Italy, if we have never an accident, +will take us at the least four days; it will take our pursuers three. We +must have one clear day before her Highness's evasion is discovered. +Now, the chief magistrate of Innspruck visits her Highness's apartments +twice a day,--at ten in the morning and at ten of the night. The +Princess must be rescued at night; and if her escape is discovered in +the morning she will never reach Italy, she will be behind the bars +again." + +"But the Princess's mother will be left," said Gaydon. "She can plead +that her daughter is ill." + +"The magistrate forces his way into the very bedroom. We must take with +us a woman who will lie in her Highness's bed with the curtains drawn +about her and a voice so weak with suffering that she cannot raise it +above a whisper, with eyes so tired from sleeplessness she cannot bear a +light near them. Help me in this. Name me a woman with the fortitude to +stay behind." + +Gaydon shook his head. + +"She will certainly be discovered. The part she plays in the escape must +certainly be known. She will remain for the captors to punish as they +will. I know no woman." + +"Nay," said Wogan; "you exaggerate her danger. Once the escape is +brought to an issue, once her Highness is in Bologna safe, the Emperor +cannot wreak vengeance on a woman; it would be too paltry." And now he +made his appeal to Misset. + +"No, my friend," Misset replied. "I know no woman with the fortitude." + +"But you do," interrupted O'Toole. "So do I. There's no difficulty +whatever in the matter. Mrs. Misset has a maid." + +"Oho!" said Gaydon. + +"The maid's name is Jenny." + +"Aha!" said Wogan. + +"She's a very good friend of mine." + +"O'Toole!" cried Misset, indignantly. "My wife's maid--a very good +friend of yours?" + +"Sure she is, and you didn't know it," said O'Toole, with a chuckle. "I +am the cunning man, after all. She would do a great deal for me would +Jenny." + +"But has she courage?" asked Wogan. + +"Faith, her father was a French grenadier and her mother a _vivandiere_. +It would be a queer thing if she was frightened by a little matter of +lying in bed and pretending to be someone else." + +"But can we trust her with the secret?" asked Gaydon. + +"No!" exclaimed Misset, and he rose angrily from his chair. "My wife's +maid--O'Toole--O'Toole--my wife's maid. Did ever one hear the like?" + +"My friend," said O'Toole, quietly, "it seems almost as if you wished to +reflect upon Jenny's character, which would not be right." + +Misset looked angrily at O'Toole, who was not at all disturbed. Then he +said, "Well, at all events, she gossips. We cannot take her. She would +tell the whole truth of our journey at the first halt." + +"That's true," said O'Toole. + +Then for the second time that evening he cried, "I have an idea." + +"Well?" + +"We'll not tell her the truth at all. I doubt if she would come if we +told it her. Jenny very likely has never heard of her Highness the +Princess, and I doubt if she cares a button for the King. Besides, she +would never believe but that we were telling her a lie. No. We'll make +up a probable likely sort of story, and then she'll believe it to be the +truth." + +"I have it," cried Wogan. "We'll tell her that we are going to abduct an +heiress who is dying for love of O'Toole, and whose merciless parents +are forcing her into a loveless, despicable marriage with a tottering +pantaloon." + +O'Toole brought his hand down upon the arm of the chair. + +"There's the very story," he cried. "To be sure, you are a great man, +Charles. The most probable convincing story that was ever invented! Oh! +but you'll hear Jenny sob with pity for the heiress and Lucius O'Toole +when she hears it. It will be a bad day, too, for the merciless parents +when they discover Jenny in her Highness's bed. She stands six feet in +her stockings." + +"Six feet!" exclaimed Wogan. + +"In her stockings," returned O'Toole. "Her height is her one vanity. +Therefore in her shoes she is six feet four." + +"Well, she must take her heels off and make herself as short as she +can." + +"You will have trouble, my friend, to persuade her to that," said +O'Toole. + +"Hush!" said Gaydon. He rose and unlocked the door. The doctor was +knocking for admission below. Gaydon let him in, and he dressed Wogan's +wounds with an assurance that they were not deep and that a few days' +quiet would restore him. + +"I will sleep the night here if I may," said Wogan, as soon as the +doctor had gone. "A blanket and a chair will serve my turn." + +They took him into Gaydon's bedroom, where three beds were ranged. + +"We have slept in the one room and lived together since your message +came four days ago," said Gaydon. "Take your choice of the beds, for +there's not one of us has so much need of a bed as you." + +Wogan drew a long breath of relief. + +"Oh! but it's good to be with you," he cried suddenly, and caught at +Gaydon's arm. "I shall sleep to-night. How I shall sleep!" + +He stretched out his aching limbs between the cool white sheets, and +when the lamp was extinguished he called to each of his three friends by +name to make sure of their company. O'Toole answered with a grunt on his +right, Misset on his left, and Gaydon from the corner of the room. + +"But I have wanted you these last three days!" said Wogan. "To-morrow +when I tell you the story of them you will know how much I have wanted +you." + +They got, however, some inkling of Wogan's need before the morrow came. +In the middle of the night they were wakened by a wild scream and heard +Wogan whispering in an agony for help. They lighted a lamp and saw him +lying with his hand upon his throat and his eyes starting from his head +with horror. + +"Quick," said he, "the hand at my throat! It's not the letter so much, +it's my life they want." + +"It's your own hand," said Gaydon, and taking the hand he found it +lifeless. Wogan's arm in that position had gone to sleep, as the saying +is. He had waked suddenly in the dark with the cold pressure at his +throat, and in the moment of waking was back again alone in the inn near +Augsburg. Wogan indeed needed his friends. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The next morning Wogan was tossing from side to side in a high fever. +The fever itself was of no great importance, but it had consequences of +a world-wide influence, for it left Wogan weak and tied to his bed; so +that it was Gaydon who travelled to Rome and obtained the Pope's +passport. Gaydon consequently saw what otherwise Wogan would have seen; +and Gaydon, the cautious, prudent Gaydon, was careful to avoid making an +inopportune discovery, whereas Wogan would never have rested until he +had made it. + +Gaydon stayed in Rome a week, lying snug and close in a lodging only one +street removed from that house upon the Tiber where his King lived. +Secrets had a way of leaking out, and Gaydon was determined that this +one should not through any inattention of his. He therefore never went +abroad until dark, and even then kept aloof from the house which +overlooked the Tiber. His business he conducted through his servant, +sending him to and fro between Edgar, the secretary, and himself. One +audience of his King alone he asked, and that was to be granted him on +the day of his departure from Rome. + +Thus the time hung very heavily upon him. From daybreak to dusk he was +cooped within a little insignificant room which looked out upon a little +insignificant street. His window, however, though it promised little +diversion, was his one resource. Gaydon was a man of observation, and +found a pleasure in guessing at this and that person's business from his +appearance, his dress, and whether he went fast or slow. So he sat +steadily at his window, and after a day or two had passed he began to be +puzzled. The moment he was puzzled he became interested. On the second +day he drew his chair a little distance back from the window and +watched. On the third day he drew his chair close to the window, but at +the side and against the wall. In this way he could see everything that +happened and everyone who passed, and yet remain himself unobserved. + +Almost opposite to his window stood a small mean house fallen into +neglect and disrepair. The windows were curtained with dust, many of the +panes were broken, the shutters hung upon broken hinges, the paint was +peeling from the door. The house had the most melancholy aspect of long +disuse. It seemed to belong to no one and to be crumbling pitifully to +ruin like an aged man who has no friends. Yet this house had its uses, +which Gaydon could not but perceive were of a secret kind. On the very +first day that Gaydon sat at his window a man, who seemed from his dress +to be of a high consideration, came sauntering along that sordid +thoroughfare, where he seemed entirely out of place, like a butterfly +on the high seas. To Gaydon's surprise he stopped at the door, gave a +cautious look round, and rapped quickly with his stick. At once the door +of that uninhabited house was opened. The man entered, the door was +closed upon him, and a good hour by Gaydon's watch elapsed before it was +opened again to let him out. In the afternoon another man came and was +admitted with the same secrecy. Both men had worn their hats drawn down +upon their foreheads, and whereas one of them held a muffler to his +face, the other had thrust his chin within the folds of his cravat. +Gaydon had not been able to see the face of either. After nightfall he +remarked that such visits became more frequent. Moreover, they were +repeated on the next day and the next. Gaydon watched, but never got any +nearer to a solution of the mystery. At the end of the sixth day he was +more puzzled and interested than ever, for closely as he had watched he +had not seen the face of any man who had passed in and out of that door. + +But he was to see a face that night. + +At nine o'clock a messenger from Edgar, the secretary, brought him a +package which contained a letter and the passport for these six days +delayed. The letter warned him that Edgar himself would come to fetch +him in the morning to his audience with James. The passport gave +authority to a Flemish nobleman, the Count of Cernes, to make a +pilgrimage to Loretto with his wife and family. The name of Warner had +served its turn and could no longer be employed. + +As soon as the messenger had gone, Gaydon destroyed Edgar's letter, put +the passport safely away in his breast, and since he had not left his +room that day, put on his hat. Being a prudent man with a turn for +economy, he also extinguished his lamp. He had also a liking for fresh +air, so he opened the window, and at the same moment the door of the +house opposite was opened. A tall burly man with a lantern in his hand +stepped out into the street; he was followed by a slight man of a short +stature. Both men were wrapped in their cloaks, but the shorter one +tripped on a break in the road and his cloak fell apart. His companion +turned at once and held his lantern aloft. Just for a second the light +therefore flashed upon a face, and Gaydon at his dark window caught a +glimpse of it. The face was the face of his King. + +Gaydon was more than ever puzzled. He had only seen the face for an +instant; moreover, he was looking down upon it, so that he might be +mistaken. He felt, however, that he was not, and he began to wonder at +the business that could take his King to this mysterious house. But +there was one thing of which he was sure amidst all his doubts, Rome was +not the safest city in the world for a man to walk about at nights. His +King would be none the worse off for a second guardian who would follow +near enough to give help and far enough for discretion. Gaydon went down +his stairs into the street. The lantern twinkled ahead; Gaydon followed +it until it stopped before a great house which had lights burning here +and there in the windows. The smaller man mounted the steps and was +admitted; his big companion with the lantern remained outside. + +Gaydon, wishing to make sure of his conjectures one way or the other, +walked quickly past him and stole a glance sideways at his face. But the +man with the lantern looked at Gaydon at the same moment. Their eyes +met, and the lantern was immediately held aloft. + +"It is Major Gaydon." + +Gaydon had to make the best of the business. He bowed. + +"Mr. Whittington, I think." + +"Sir," said Whittington, politely, "I am honoured by your memory. For +myself, I never forget a face though I see it but for a moment between +the light and the dark, but I do not expect the like from my +acquaintances. We did meet, I believe, in Paris? You are of Dillon's +regiment?" + +"And on leave in Rome," said Gaydon, a trifle hastily. + +"On leave?" said Whittington, idly. "Well, so far as towns go, Rome is +as good as another, though, to tell the truth, I find them all quite +unendurable. Would I were on leave! but I am pinned here, a watchman +with a lantern. I do but lack a rattle, though, to be sure, I could not +spring it. We are secret to-night, major. Do you know what house this +is?" + +"No," replied Gaydon. "But I am waited for and will bid you good-night." + +He had a thought that the Chevalier, since he would be secret, had +chosen his watchman rather ill. He had no wish to pry, and so was for +returning to his lodging; but that careless, imprudent man, Whittington, +would not lose a companion so easily. He caught Gaydon by the arm. + +"Well, it is the house of Maria Vittoria, Mademoiselle de Caprara, the +heiress of Bologna, who has only this evening come to Rome. And so no +later than this evening I am playing link-boy, appointed by letters +patent, one might say. But what will you? Youth is youth, whether in a +ploughboy or a--But my tongue needs a gag. Another word, and I had said +too much. Well, since you will be going, good-night. We shall meet, no +doubt, in a certain house that overlooks the Tiber." + +"Hardly," said Gaydon, "since I leave Rome to-morrow." + +"Indeed? You leave Rome to-morrow?" said Whittington. "I would I were as +fortunate," and he jerked his thumb dolefully towards the Caprara +Palace. Gaydon hesitated for a moment, considering whether or not he +should ask Whittington to be silent upon their meeting. But he +determined the man was too incautious in his speech. If he begged him +not to mention Gaydon's presence in Rome, he would remember it the more +surely, and if nothing was said he might forget it. Gaydon wished him +good-night and went back to his lodging, walking rather moodily. +Whittington looked after him and chuckled. + +Meanwhile, in a room of the house two people sat,--one the slight, +graceful man who had accompanied Whittington and whom Gaydon had +correctly guessed to be his King, the other, Maria Vittoria de Caprara. +The Chevalier de St. George was speaking awkwardly with a voice which +broke. Maria listened with a face set and drawn. She was a girl both in +features and complexion of a remarkable purity. Of colour, but for her +red lips, she had none. Her hair was black, her face of a clear pallor +which her hair made yet more pale. Her eyes matched her hair, and were +so bright and quick a starry spark seemed to glow in the depths of them. +She was a poet's simile for night. + +The Chevalier ended and sat with his eyes turned away. Maria Vittoria +did not change her attitude, nor for a while did she answer, but the +tears gathered in her eyes and welled over. They ran down her cheeks; +she did not wipe them away, she did not sob, nor did her face alter from +its fixity. She did not even close her eyes. Only the tears rained down +so silently that the Prince was not aware of them. He had even a thought +as he sat with his head averted that she might have shown a trifle more +of distress, and it was almost with a reproach upon his lips that he +turned to her. Never was a man more glad that he had left a word +unspoken. This silent grief of tears cut him to the heart. + +"Maria!" he cried, and moved towards her. She made no gesture to repel +him, she did not move, but she spoke in a whisper. + +"His Holiness the Pope had consented to our marriage. What would I not +have done for you?" + +The Chevalier stooped over her and took her hand. The hand remained +inert in his. + +"Maria!" + +"Would that I were poor! Would that I were powerless! But I am rich--so +rich. I could have done so much. I am alone--so much alone. What would I +not have done for you?" + +"Maria!" + +His voice choked upon the word, his lips touched her hair, and she +shivered from head to foot. Then her hand tightened fast upon his; she +drew him down almost fiercely until he sank upon his knees by her side; +she put an arm about his shoulder and held him to her breast. + +"But you love me," she said quickly. "Tell me so! Say, 'I love you, I +love you, I love you.' Oh that we both could die, you saying it, I +hearing it,--die to-night, like this, my arm about you, your face +against my heart! My lord, my lord!" and then she flung him from her, +holding him at arm's length. "Say it with your eyes on mine! I can see +though the tears fall. I shall never hear the words again after +to-night. Do not stint me of them; let them flow just as these tears +flow. They will leave no more trace than do my tears." + +"Maria, I love you," said the Chevalier. "How I do love you!" He took +her hands from his shoulders and pressed his forehead upon them. She +leaned forward, and in a voice so low it seemed her heart was +whispering, not her mouth, she made her prayer. + +"Say that you have no room in your thoughts except for me. Say that you +have no scrap of love--" He dropped her hands and drew away; she caught +him to her. "No, no! Say that you have no scrap of love to toss to the +woman there in Innspruck!" + +"Maria!" he exclaimed. + +"Hush!" said she, with a woful smile. "To-morrow you shall love her; +to-morrow I will not ask your eyes to dwell on mine or your hand to +quiver as it touches mine. But to-night love no one but me." + +For answer he kissed her on the lips. She took his head between her +hands and gave the kiss back, gently as though her lips feared to bruise +his, slowly as though this one moment must content her for all her life. +Then she looked at him for a little, and with a childish movement that +was infinitely sad she laid his face side by side with hers so that his +cheek touched hers. + +"Shall I tell you my thought?" she asked. "Shall I dare to tell you it?" + +"Tell it me!" + +"God has died to-night. Hush! Do not move! Do not speak! Perhaps the +world will slip and crumble if we but stay still." And they remained +thus cheek to cheek silent in the room, staring forward with eyes wide +open and hopeful. The very air seemed to them a-quiver with +expectation. They, too, had an expectant smile upon their lips. But +there was no crack of thunder overhead, no roar of a slipping world. + +[Illustration: "CHEEK TO CHEEK, SILENT IN THE ROOM, STARING FORWARD WITH +EYES WIDE OPEN AND HOPEFUL."--_Page 136_.] The Chevalier was the first +to move. + +"But we are children," he cried, starting up. "Is it not strange the +very pain which tortures us because we are man and woman should sink us +into children? We sit hoping that a miracle will split the world in +pieces! This is the Caprara Palace; Whittington drowses outside over his +lantern; and to-morrow Gaydon rides with his passport northwards to +Charles Wogan." + +The name hurt Maria Vittoria like a physical torture. She beat her hands +together with a cry, "I hate him! I hate him!" + +"Yet I have no better servant!" + +"Speak no good word of him in my ears! He robs me of you." + +"He risks his life for me." + +"I will pray that he may lose it." + +"Maria!" + +The Chevalier started, thrilled and almost appalled by the violence of +her passion. + +"I do pray," she cried. "Every fibre in me tingles with the prayer. Oh, +I hate him! Why did you give him leave to rescue her?" + +"Could I refuse? I did delay him; I did hesitate. Only to-day Gaydon +receives the passport, and even so I have delayed too long. Indeed, +Maria, I dare not think of the shame, the danger, her Highness has +endured for me, lest my presence here, even for this farewell, should +too bitterly reproach me." + +At that all Maria Vittoria's vehemence left her. She fell to beseechings +and entreaties. With her vehemence went also her dignity. She dropped +upon her knees and dragged herself across the room to him. To James her +humility was more terrible than her passion, for passion had always +distinguished her, and he was familiar with it; but pride had always +gone hand in hand with it. He stepped forward and would have raised her +from the ground, but Maria would have none of his help; she crouched at +his feet pleading. + +"You told me business would call you to Spain. Go there! Stay there! For +a little--oh, not for long! But for a month, say, after your Princess +comes triumphing into Bologna. Promise me that! I could not bear that +you should meet her as she comes. There would be shouts; I can hear +them. No, I will not have it! I can see her proud cursed face a-flush. +No! You think too much of what she has suffered. If I could have +suffered too! But suffering, shame, humiliation, these fall to women, +always have fallen. We have learnt to bear them so that we feel them +less than you. My dear lord, believe me! Her suffering is no great +thing. If we love we welcome it! Each throb of pain endured for love +becomes a thrill of joy. If I could have suffered too!" + +It was strange to hear this girl with the streaming eyes and tormented +face bewail her fate in that she had not won that great privilege of +suffering. She knelt on the ground a splendid image of pain, and longed +for pain that she might prove thereby how little a thing she made of it. +The Chevalier drew a stool to her side and seating himself upon it +clasped her about the waist. She laid her cheek upon his knee just as a +dog will do. + +"Sweetheart," said he, "I would have no woman suffer a pang for me had I +my will of the world. But since that may not be, I do not believe that +any woman could be deeper hurt than you are now." + +"Not Clementina?" + +"No." + +Maria uttered a little sigh. Her pain gave her a sort of ownership of +the man who caused it. "Nor can she love as deep," she continued +quietly. "A Sobieski from the snows! Love was born here in Italy. She +robs me of you. I hate her." Then she raised her face eagerly. "Charles +Wogan may fail." + +"You do not know him." + +"The cleverest have made mistakes and died for them." + +"Wogan makes mistakes like another, but somehow gets the better of them +in the end. There was a word he said to me when he begged for my +permission. I told him his plan was a mere dream. He answered he would +dream it true; he will." + +"You should have waked him. You were the master, he the servant. You +were the King." + +"And when can the King do what he wills instead of what he must? Maria, +if you and I had met before I sent Charles Wogan to search out a wife +for me--" + +Maria Vittoria knelt up. She drew herself away. + +"He chose her as your wife?" + +"If only I had had time to summon him back!" + +"He chose her--Charles Wogan. How I hate him!" + +"I sent him to make the choice." + +"And he might have gone no step beyond Bologna. There was I not a mile +distant ready to his hand! But I was too mean, too despicable--" + +"Maria, hush!" And the troubled voice in which he spoke rang with so +much pain that she was at once contrite with remorse. + +"My lord, I hurt you, so you see how I am proven mean. Give me your hand +and laugh to me; laugh with your heart and eyes and lips. I am jealous +of your pain. I am a woman. I would have it all, gather it all into my +bosom, and cherish each sharp stab like a flower my lover gives to me. I +am glad of them. They are flowers that will not wither. Add a kiss, +sweetheart, the sharpest stab, and so the chief flower, the very rose of +flowers. There, that is well," and she rose from her knees and turned +away. So she stood for a little, and when she turned again she wore upon +her face the smile which she had bidden rise in his. + +"Would we were free!" cried the Chevalier. + +"But since we are not, let us show brave faces to the world and hide our +hearts. I do wish you all happiness. But you will go to Spain. There's +a friend's hand in warrant of the wish." + +She held out a hand which clasped his firmly without so much as a +tremor. + +"Good-night, my friend," said she. "Speak those same words to me, and no +word more. I am tired with the day's doings. I have need of sleep, oh, +great need of it!" + +The Chevalier read plainly the overwhelming strain her counterfeit of +friendliness put upon her. He dared not prolong it. Even as he looked at +her, her lips quivered and her eyes swam. + +"Good-night, my friend," said he. + +She conducted him along a wide gallery to the great staircase where her +lackeys waited. Then he bowed to her and she curtsied low to him, but no +word was spoken by either. This little comedy must needs be played in +pantomime lest the actors should spoil it with a show of broken hearts. + +Maria Vittoria went back to the room. She could have hindered Wogan if +she had had the mind. She had the time to betray him; she knew of his +purpose. But the thought of betrayal never so much as entered her +thoughts. + +She hated him, she hated Clementina, but she was loyal to her King. She +sat alone in her palace, her chin propped upon her hands, and in a +little in her wide unblinking eyes the tears gathered again and rolled +down her cheeks and on her hands. She wept silently and without a +movement, like a statue weeping. + +The Chevalier found Whittington waiting for him, but the candle in his +lantern had burned out. + +"I have kept you here a wearisome long time," he said with an effort. It +was not easy for him to speak upon an indifferent matter. + +"I had some talk with Major Gaydon which helped me to beguile it," said +Whittington. + +"Gaydon!" exclaimed the Chevalier, "are you certain?" + +"A man may make mistakes in the darkness," said Whittington. + +"To be sure." + +"And I never had an eye for faces." + +"It was not Gaydon, then?" said the Chevalier. + +"It may not have been," said Whittington, "and by the best of good +fortune I said nothing to him of any significance whatever." + +The Chevalier was satisfied with the reply. He had chosen the right +attendant for this nocturnal visit. Had Gaydon met with a more observant +man than Whittington outside the Caprara Palace, he might have got a +number of foolish suspicions into his head. + +Gaydon, however, was at that moment in his bed, saying to himself that +there were many matters concerning which it would be an impertinence for +him to have one meddlesome thought. By God's blessing he was a soldier +and no politician. He fell asleep comforted by that conclusion. + +In the morning Edgar, the Chevalier's secretary, came privately to him. + +"The King will receive you now," said he. "Let us go." + +"It is broad daylight. We shall be seen." + +"Not if the street is empty," said Edgar, looking out of the window. + +The street, as it chanced, was for the moment empty. Edgar crossed the +street and rapped quickly with certain pauses between the raps on the +door of that deserted house into which Gaydon had watched men enter. The +door was opened. "Follow me," said Edgar. Gaydon followed him into a +bare passage unswept and with discoloured walls. A man in a little hutch +in the wall opened and closed the door with a string. + +Edgar walked forward to the end of the passage with Gaydon at his heels. +The two men came to a flight of stone steps, which they descended. The +steps led to a dark and dripping cellar with no pavement but the mud, +and that depressed into puddles. The air was cold and noisome; the walls +to the touch of Gaydon's hand were greasy with slime. He followed Edgar +across the cellar into a sort of tunnel. Here Edgar drew an end of +candle from his pocket and lighted it. The tunnel was so low that +Gaydon, though a shortish man, could barely hold his head erect. He +followed Edgar to the end and up a flight of winding steps. The air grew +warmer and dryer. They had risen above ground, the spiral wound within +the thickness of a wall. The steps ended abruptly; there was no door +visible; in face of them and on each side the bare stone walls enclosed +them. Edgar stooped down and pressed with his finger on a round +insignificant discolouration of the stone. Then he stood up again. + +"You will breathe no word of this passage, Major Gaydon," said he. "The +house was built a century ago when Rome was more troubled than it is +to-day, but the passage was never more useful than now. Men from +England, whose names it would astonish you to know, have trodden these +steps on a secret visit to the King. Ah!" From the wall before their +faces a great slab of the size of a door sank noiselessly down and +disclosed a wooden panel. The panel slid aside. Edgar and Gaydon stepped +into a little cabinet lighted by a single window. The room was empty. +Gaydon took a peep out of the window and saw the Tiber eddying beneath. +Edgar went to a corner and touched a spring. The stone slab rose from +its grooves; the panel slid back across it; at the same moment the door +of the room was opened, and the Chevalier stepped across the threshold. + +Gaydon could no longer even pretend to doubt who had walked with +Whittington to the Caprara Palace the night before. It was none of his +business, however, he assured himself. If his King dwelt with emphasis +upon the dangers of the enterprise, it was not his business to remark +upon it or to be thereby disheartened. The King said very graciously +that he would hold the major and his friends in no less esteem if by any +misfortune they came back empty-handed. That was most kind of him, but +it was none of Gaydon's business. The King was ill at ease and looked as +though he had not slept a wink the livelong night. Well, swollen eyes +and a patched pallid face disfigure all men at times, and in any case +they were none of Gaydon's business. + +He rode out of Rome that afternoon as the light was failing. He rode at +a quick trot, and did not notice at the corner of a street a big +stalwart man who sauntered along swinging his stick by the tassel with a +vacant look of idleness upon the passers-by. He stopped and directed the +same vacant look at Gaydon. + +But he was thinking curiously, "Will he tell Charles Wogan?" + +The stalwart man was Harry Whittington. + +Gaydon, however, never breathed a word about the Caprara Palace when he +handed the passport to Charles Wogan at Schlestadt. Wogan was sitting +propped up with pillows in a chair, and he asked Gaydon many questions +of the news at Rome, and how the King bore himself. + +"The King was not in the best of spirits," said Gaydon. + +"With this," cried Wogan, flourishing the passport, "we'll find a means +to hearten him." + +Gaydon filled a pipe and lighted it. + +"Will you tell me, Wogan," he asked,--"I am by nature curious,--was it +the King who proposed this enterprise to you, or was it you who proposed +it to the King?" + +The question had an extraordinary effect. Wogan was startled out of his +chair. + +"What do you mean?" he exclaimed fiercely. There was something more than +fierceness in the words,--an accent of fear, it almost seemed to Gaydon. +There was a look almost of fear in his eyes, as though he had let some +appalling secret slip. Gaydon stared at him in wonder, and Wogan +recovered himself with a laugh. "Faith," said he, "it is a question to +perplex a man. I misdoubt but we both had the thought about the same +time. 'Wogan,' said he, 'there's the Princess with a chain on her leg, +so to speak,' and I answered him, 'A chain's a galling sort of thing to +a lady's ankle.' There was little more said if I remember right." + +Gaydon nodded as though his curiosity was now satisfied. Wogan's alarm +was strange, no doubt, strange and unexpected like the Chevalier's visit +to the Caprara Palace. Gaydon had a glimpse of dark and troubled waters, +but he turned his face away. They were none of his business. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +In an hour, however, he returned out of breath and with a face white +from despair. Wogan was still writing at his table, but at his first +glance towards Gaydon he started quickly to his feet, and altogether +forgot to cover over his sheet of paper. He carefully shut the door. + +"You have bad news," said he. + +"There was never worse," answered Gaydon. He had run so fast, he was so +discomposed, that he could with difficulty speak. But he gasped his bad +news out in the end. + +"I went to my brother major to report my return. He was entertaining his +friends. He had a letter this morning from Strasbourg and he read it +aloud. The letter said a rumour was running through the town that the +Chevalier Wogan had already rescued the Princess and was being hotly +pursued on the road to Trent." + +If Wogan felt any disquietude he was careful to hide it. He sat +comfortably down upon the sofa. + +"I expected rumour would be busy with us," said he, "but never that it +would take so favourable a shape." + +"Favourable!" exclaimed Gaydon. + +"To be sure, for its falsity will be established to-morrow, and +ridicule cast upon those who spread and believed it. False alarms are +the proper strategy to conceal the real assault. The rumour does us a +service. Our secret is very well kept, for here am I in Schlestadt, and +people living in Schlestadt believe me on the road to Trent. I will go +back with you to the major's and have a laugh at his correspondent. +Courage, my friend. We will give our enemies a month. Let them cry wolf +as often as they will during that month, we'll get into the fold all the +more easily in the end." + +Wogan took his hat to accompany Gaydon, but at that moment he heard +another man stumbling in a great haste up the stairs. Misset broke into +the room with a face as discomposed as Gaydon's had been. + +"Here's another who has heard the same rumour," said Wogan. + +"It is more than a rumour," said Misset. "It is an order, and most +peremptory, from the Court of France, forbidding any officer of Dillon's +regiment to be absent for more than twenty-four hours from his duties on +pain of being broke. Our secret's out. That's the plain truth of the +matter." + +He stood by the table drumming with his fingers in a great agitation. +Then his fingers stopped. He had been drumming upon Wogan's sheet of +paper, and the writing on the sheet had suddenly attracted his notice. +It was writing in unusually regular lines. Gaydon, arrested by Misset's +change from restlessness to fixity, looked that way for a second, too, +but he turned his head aside very quickly. Wogan's handwriting was none +of his business. + +"We will give them a month," said Wogan, who was conjecturing at the +motive of this order from the Court of France. "No doubt we are +suspected. I never had a hope that we should not be. The Court of +France, you see, can do no less than forbid us, but I should not be +surprised if it winks at us on the sly. We will give them a month. +Colonel Lally is a friend of mine and a friend of the King. We will get +an abatement of that order, so that not one of you shall be cashiered." + +"I don't flinch at that," said Misset, "but the secret's out." + +"Then we must use the more precautions," said Wogan. He had no doubt +whatever that somehow he would bring the Princess safely out of her +prison to Bologna. It could not be that she was born to be wasted. +Misset, however, was not so confident upon the matter. + +"A strange, imperturbable man is Charles Wogan," said he to Gaydon and +O'Toole the same evening. "Did you happen by any chance to cast your eye +over the paper I had my hand on?" + +"I did not," said Gaydon, in a great hurry. "It was a private letter, no +doubt." + +"It was poetry. There's no need for you to hurry, my friend. It was more +than mere poetry, it was in Latin. I read the first line on the page, +and it ran, '_Te, dum spernit, arat novus accola; max ubi cultam_--'" + +Gaydon tore his arm away from Misset. "I'll hear no more of it," he +cried. "Poetry is none of my business." + +"There, Dick, you are wrong," said O'Toole, sententiously. Both Misset +and Gaydon came to a dead stop and stared. Never had poetry so strange +an advocate. O'Toole set his great legs apart and his arms akimbo. He +rocked himself backwards and forwards on his heels and toes, while a +benevolent smile of superiority wrinkled across his broad face from ear +to ear. "Yes, I've done it," said he; "I've written poetry. It is a +thing a polite gentleman should be able to do. So I did it. It wasn't in +Latin, because the young lady it was written to didn't understand Latin. +Her name was Lucy, and I rhymed her to 'juicy,' and the pleasure of it +made her purple in the face. There were to have been four lines, but +there were never more than three and a half because I could not think of +a suitable rhyme to O'Toole. Lucy said she knew one, but she would never +tell it me." + +Wogan's poetry, however, was of quite a different kind, and had Gaydon +looked at it a trifle more closely, he would have experienced some +relief. It was all about the sorrows and miseries of his unfortunate +race and the cruel oppression of England. England owed all its great men +to Ireland and was currish enough never to acknowledge the debt. Wogan +always grew melancholy and grave-faced on that subject when he had the +leisure to be idle. He thought bitterly of the many Irish officers sent +into exile and killed in the service of alien countries; his sense of +injustice grew into a passionate sort of despair, and the despair +tumbled out of him in sonorous Latin verse written in the Virgilian +measure. He wrote a deal of it during this month of waiting, and a long +while afterwards sent an extract to Dr. Swift and received the great +man's compliments upon its felicity, as anyone may see for himself in +the doctor's correspondence. + +How the month passed for James Stuart in Rome may be partly guessed from +a letter which was brought to Wogan by Michael Vezozzi, the Chevalier's +body-servant. + +The letter announced that King George of England had offered the +Princess Clementina a dowry of L100,000 if she would marry the Prince of +Baden, and that the Prince of Baden with a numerous following was +already at Innspruck to prosecute his suit. + +"I do not know but what her Highness," he wrote, "will receive the best +consolation for her sufferings on my account if she accepts so +favourable a proposal, rather than run so many hazards as she must needs +do as my wife. For myself, I have been summoned most urgently into Spain +and am travelling thither on the instant." + +Wogan could make neither head nor tail of the letter. Why should the +King go to Spain at the time when the Princess Clementina might be +expected at Bologna? It was plain that he did not expect Wogan would +succeed. He was disheartened. Wogan came to the conclusion that there +was the whole meaning of the letter. He was, however, for other reasons +glad to receive it. + +"It is very well I have this letter," said he, "for until it came I had +no scrap of writing whatever to show either to her Highness or, what I +take to be more important, to her Highness's mother," and he went back +to his poetry. + +Misset and his wife, on the other hand, drove forward to the town of +Colmar, where they bought a travelling carriage and the necessaries for +the journey. Misset left his wife at Colmar, but returned every +twenty-four hours himself. They made the excuse that Misset had won a +deal of money at play and was minded to lay it out in presents to his +wife. The stratagem had a wonderful success at Schlestadt, especially +amongst the ladies, who could do nothing day and night but praise in +their husbands' hearing so excellent a mode of disposing of one's +winnings. + +O'Toole spent his month in polishing his pistols and sharpening his +sword. It is true that he had to persuade Jenny to bear them company, +but that was the work of an afternoon. He told her the story of the rich +Austrian heiress, promised her a hundred guineas and a damask gown, gave +her a kiss, and the matter was settled. + +Jenny passed her month in a delicious excitement. She was a daughter of +the camp, and had no fears whatever. She was a conspirator; she was +trusted with a tremendous secret; she was to help the beautiful and +enormous O'Toole to a rich and beautiful wife; she was to outwit an old +curmudgeon of an uncle; she was to succour a maiden heart-broken and +imprisoned. Jenny was quite uplifted. Never had a maid-servant been born +to so high a destiny. Her only difficulty was to keep silence, and when +the silence became no longer endurable she would run on some excuse or +another to Wogan and divert him with the properest sentiments. + +"To me," she would cry, "there's nothing sinful in changing clothes +with the beautiful mistress of O'Toole. Christian charity says we are to +make others happy. I am a Christian, and as to the uncle he can go to +the devil! He can do nothing to me but talk, and I don't understand his +stupid language." + +Jenny was the one person really happy during this month. It was Wogan's +effort to keep her so, for she was the very pivot of his plan. + +There remains yet one other who had most reason of all to repine at the +delay, the Princess Clementina. Her mother wearied her with perpetual +complaints, the Prince of Baden, who was allowed admittance to the +villa, persecuted her with his attentions; she knew nothing of what was +planned for her escape, and the rigorous confinement was not relaxed. It +was not a happy time for Clementina. Yet she was not entirely unhappy. A +thought had come to her and stayed with her which called the colour to +her cheeks and a smile to her lips. It accounted to her for the delay; +her pride was restored by it; because of it she became yet more patient +with her mother, more gentle with the Prince of Baden, more +good-humoured to her gaolers. It sang at her heart like a bird; it +lightened in her grey eyes. It had come to her one sleepless night, and +the morning had not revealed it as a mere phantasy born of the night. +The more she pondered it, the more certain was she of its truth. Her +King was coming himself at the hazard of his life to rescue her. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Therefore she waited in patience. It was still winter at Innspruck, +though the calendar declared it to be spring. April was budless and +cold, a month of storms; the snow drifted deep along the streets and M. +Chateaudoux was much inconvenienced during his promenades in the +afternoon. He would come back with most reproachful eyes for Clementina +in that she so stubbornly clung to her vagabond exile and refused so +fine a match as the Prince of Baden. On the afternoon of the 25th, +however, Clementina read more than reproach in his eyes, more than +discomfort in the agitation of his manner. The little chamberlain was +afraid. + +Clementina guessed the reason of his fear. + +"He has come!" she cried. The exultation of her voice, the deep breath +she drew, the rush of blood to her face, and the sudden dancing light in +her eyes showed how much constraint she had set upon herself. She was +like an ember blown to a flame. "You were stopped in your walk. You have +a message for me. He has come!" + +The height of her joy was the depth of Chateaudoux's regret. + +"I was stopped in my walk," said he, "but not by the Chevalier Wogan. +Who it was I do not know." + +"Can you not guess?" cried Clementina. + +"I would not trust a stranger," said her mother. + +"Would you not?" asked Clementina, with a smile. "Describe him to me." + +"His face was wrinkled," said Chateaudoux. + +"It was disguised." + +"His figure was slight and not over-tall." + +M. Chateaudoux gave a fairly accurate description of Gaydon. + +"I know no one whom the portrait fits," said the mother, and again +Clementina cried,-- + +"Can you not guess? Then, mother, I will punish you. For though I +know--in very truth, I know--I will not tell you." She turned back to +Chateaudoux. "Well, his message? He did fix a time, a day, an hour, for +my escape?" + +"The 27th is the day, and at eight o'clock of the night." + +"I will be ready." + +"He will come here to fetch your Highness. Meanwhile he prays your +Highness to fall sick and keep your bed." + +"I can choose my malady," said Clementina. "It will not all be +counterfeit, for indeed I shall fall sick of joy. But why must I fall +sick?" + +"He brings a woman to take your place, who, lying in bed with the +curtains drawn, will the later be discovered." + +The Princess's mother saw here a hindrance to success and eagerly she +spoke of it. + +"How will the woman enter? How, too, will my daughter leave?" + +M. Chateaudoux coughed and hemmed in a great confusion. He explained in +delicate hints that he himself was to bribe the sentry at the door to +let her pass for a few moments into the house. The Princess broke into a +laugh. + +"Her name is Friederika, I'll warrant," she cried. "My poor Chateaudoux, +they _will_ give you a sweetheart. It is most cruel. Well, Friederika, +thanks to the sentry's fellow-feeling for a burning heart, Friederika +slips in at the door." + +"Which I have taken care should stand unlatched. She changes clothes +with your Highness, and your Highness--" + +"Slips out in her stead." + +"But he is to come for you, he says," exclaimed her mother. "And how +will he do that? Besides, we do not know his name. And there must be a +fitting companion who will travel with you. Has he that companion?" + +"Your Highness," said Chateaudoux, "upon all those points he bade me say +you should be satisfied. All he asks is that you will be ready at the +time." + +A gust of hail struck the window and made the room tremble. Clementina +laughed; her mother shivered. + +"The Prince of Baden," said she, with a sigh. Clementina shrugged her +shoulders. + +"A Prince," said Chateaudoux, persuasively, "with much territory to his +princeliness." + +"A vain, fat, pudgy man," said Clementina. + +"A sober, honest gentleman," said the mother. + +"A sober butler to an honest gentleman," said Clementina. + +"He has an air," said Chateaudoux. + +"He has indeed," replied Clementina, "as though he handed himself upon a +plate to you, and said, 'Here is a miracle. Thank God for it!' Well, I +must take to my bed. I am very ill. I have a fever on me, and that's +truth." + +She moved towards the door, but before she had reached it there came a +knocking on the street door below. + +Clementina stopped; Chateaudoux looked out of the window. + +"It is the Prince's carriage," said he. + +"I will not see him," exclaimed Clementina. + +"My child, you must," said her mother, "if only for the last time." + +"Each time he comes it is for the last time, yet the next day sees him +still in Innspruck. My patience and my courtesy are both outworn. +Besides, to-day, now that I have heard this great news we have waited +for--how long? Oh, mother, oh, mother, I cannot! I shall betray myself." + +The Princess's mother made an effort. + +"Clementina, you must receive him. I will have it so. I am your mother. +I will be your mother," she said in a tremulous tone, as though the mere +utterance of the command frightened her by its audacity. + +Clementina was softened on the instant. She ran across to her mother's +chair, and kneeling by it said with a laugh, "So you shall. I would not +barter mothers with any girl in Christendom. But you understand. I am +pledged in honour to my King. I will receive the Prince, but indeed I +would he had not come," and rising again she kissed her mother on the +forehead. + +She received the Prince of Baden alone. He was a stout man of much +ceremony and took some while to elaborate a compliment upon Clementina's +altered looks. Before, he had always seen her armed and helmeted with +dignity; now she had much ado to keep her lips from twitching into a +smile, and the smile in her eyes she could not hide at all. The Prince +took the change to himself. His persistent wooing had not been after all +in vain. He was not, however, the man to make the least of his +sufferings in the pursuit which seemed to end so suitably to-day. + +"Madam," he said with his grandest air, "I think to have given you some +proof of my devotion. Even on this inclement day I come to pay my duty +though the streets are deep in snow." + +"Oh, sir," exclaimed Clementina, "then your feet are wet. Never run such +risks for me. I would have no man weep on my account though it were only +from a cold in the head." + +The Prince glanced at Clementina suspiciously. Was this devotion? He +preferred to think so. + +"Madam, have no fears," said he, tenderly, wishing to set the anxious +creature at her ease. "I drove here in my carriage." + +"But from the carriage to the door you walked?" + +"No, madam, I was carried." + +Clementina's lips twitched again. + +"I would have given much to have seen you carried," she said demurely. +"I suppose you would not repeat the--No, it would be to ask too much. +Besides, from my windows here in the side of the house I could not see." +And she sighed deeply. + +The fatuous gentleman took comfort from the sigh. + +"Madam, you have but to say the word and your windows shall look +whichever way you will." + +Clementina, however, did not say the word. She merely sighed again. The +Prince thought it a convenient moment to assert his position. + +"I have stayed a long while in Innspruck, setting my constancy, which +bade me stay, above my dignity, which bade me go. For three months I +have stayed,--a long while, madam." + +"I do not think three years could have been longer," said Clementina, +with the utmost sympathy. + +"So now in the end I have called my pride to help me." + +"The noblest gift that heaven has given a man," said Clementina, +fervently. + +The Prince bowed low; Clementina curtsied majestically. + +[Illustration: THE PRINCE STRUTTED TO THE WINDOW; CLEMENTINA SOLEMNLY +KEPT PACE WITH HIM."--_Page 161._] + +"Will you give me your hand," said he, "as far as your window?" + +"Certainly, sir, and out of it." + +Clementina laid her hand in his. The Prince strutted to the window; +Clementina solemnly kept pace with him. + +"What do you see? A sentinel fixed there guarding you. At the door +stands a second sentinel. Answer me as I would be answered, your window +and your door are free. Refuse me, and I travel into Italy. My trunks +are already packed." + +"Neatly packed, I hope," said Clementina. Her cheek was flushed; her +lips no longer smiled. But she spoke most politely, and the Prince was +at a loss. + +"Will you give me your hand," said she, "as far as my table?" + +The Prince doubtfully stretched out his hand, and the couple paced in a +stately fashion to Clementina's table. + +"What do you see upon my table?" said she, with something of the +Prince's pomposity. + +"A picture," said he, reluctantly. + +"Whose?" + +"The Pretender's," he answered with a sneer. + +"The King's," said she, pleasantly. "His picture is fixed there guarding +me. Against my heart there lies a second. I wish your Highness all speed +to Italy." + +She dropped his hand, bowed to him again in sign that the interview was +ended. The Prince had a final argument. + +"You refuse a dowry of L100,000. I would have you think of that." + +"Sir, you think of it for both of us." + +The Prince drew himself up to his full stature. + +"I have your answer, then?" + +"You have, sir. You had it yesterday, and if I remember right the day +before." + +"I will stay yet two more days. Madam, you need not fear. I shall not +importune you. I give you those two days for reflection. Unless I hear +from you I shall leave Innspruck--" + +"In two days' time?" suddenly exclaimed Clementina. + +"On the evening of the 27th," said the Prince. + +Clementina laughed softly in a way which he did not understand. She was +altogether in a strange, incomprehensible mood that afternoon, and when +he learnt next day that she had taken to her bed he was not surprised. +Perhaps he was not altogether grieved. It seemed right that she should +be punished for her stubbornness. Punishment might soften her. + +But no message came to him during those two days, and on the morning of +the 27th he set out for Italy. + +At the second posting stage, which he reached about three of the +afternoon, he crossed a hired carriage on its way to Innspruck. The +carriage left the inn door as the Prince drove up to it. He noticed the +great size of the coachman on the box, he saw also that a man and two +women were seated within the carriage, and that a servant rode on +horseback by the door. The road, however, was a busy one; day and night +travellers passed up and down; the Prince gave only a passing scrutiny +to that carriage rolling down the hill to Innspruck. Besides, he was +acquainted neither with Gaydon, who rode within the carriage, nor with +Wogan, the servant at the door, nor with O'Toole, the fat man on the +box. + +At nightfall the Prince came to Nazareth, a lonely village amongst the +mountains with a single tavern, where he thought to sleep the night. +There was but one guest-room, however, which was already bespoken by a +Flemish lady, the Countess of Cernes, who had travelled that morning to +Innspruck to fetch her niece. + +The Prince grumbled for a little, since the evening was growing stormy +and wild, but there was no remedy. He could not dispute the matter, for +he was shown the Countess's berlin waiting ready for her return. A +servant of the Count's household also had been left behind at Nazareth +to retain the room, and this man, while using all proper civilities, +refused to give up possession. The Prince had no acquaintance with the +officers of Dillon's Irish regiment, so that he had no single suspicion +that Captain Misset was the servant. He drove on for another stage, +where he found a lodging. + +Meanwhile the hired carriage rolled into Innspruck, and a storm of +extraordinary violence burst over the country. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +In fact, just about the time when the Prince's horses were being +unharnessed from his carriage on the heights of Mount Brenner, the hired +carriage stopped before a little inn under the town wall of Innspruck +hard by the bridge. And half an hour later, when the Prince was sitting +down to his supper before a blazing fire and thanking his stars that on +so gusty and wild a night he had a stout roof above his head, a man and +a woman came out from the little tavern under the town wall and +disappeared into the darkness. They had the streets to themselves, for +that night the city was a whirlpool of the winds. Each separate chasm in +the encircling hills was a mouth to discharge a separate blast. The +winds swept down into the hollow and charged in a riotous combat about +the squares and lanes; at each corner was an ambuscade, and everywhere +they clashed with artilleries of hail and sleet. + +The man and woman staggered hand in hand and floundered in the deep +snow. They were soaked to the skin, frozen by the cold, and whipped by +the stinging hail. Though they bent their heads and bodies, though they +clung hand in hand, though they struggled with all their strength, +there were times when they could not advance a foot and must needs wait +for a lull in the shelter of a porch. At such times the man would +perhaps quote a line of Virgil about the cave of the winds, and the +woman curse like a grenadier. They, however, were not the only people +who were distressed by the storm. + +Outside the villa in which the Princess was imprisoned stood the two +sentinels, one beneath the window, the other before the door. There were +icicles upon their beards; they were so shrouded in white they had the +look of snow men built by schoolboys. Their coats of frieze could not +keep out the searching sleet, nor their caps protect their ears from the +intolerable cold. Their hands were so numbed they could not feel the +muskets they held. + +The sentinel before the door suffered the most, for whereas his +companion beneath the window had nothing but the house wall before his +eyes, he, on his part, could see on the other side of the alley of trees +the red blinds of "The White Chamois," that inn which the Chevalier de +St. George had mentioned to Charles Wogan. The red blinds shone very +cheery and comfortable upon that stormy night. The sentinel envied the +men gathered in the warmth and light behind them, and cursed his own +miserable lot as heartily as the woman in the porch did hers. The red +blinds made it unendurable. He left his post and joined his companion. + +"Rudolf," he said, bawling into his ear, "come with me! Our birds will +not fly away to-night." + +The two sentries came to the front of the house and stared at the +red-litten blinds. + +"What a night!" cried Rudolf. "Not a citizen would thrust his nose out +of doors." + +"Not even the little Chateaudoux's sweetheart," replied the other, with +a grin. + +They stared again at the red blinds, and in a lull of the wind a clock +struck nine. + +"There is an hour before the magistrate comes," said Rudolf. + +"You take that hour," said his companion; "I will have the hour after +the magistrate has gone." + +Rudolf ran across to the inn. The sentinel at the door remained behind. +Both men were pleased,--Rudolf because he had his hour immediately, his +fellow-soldier because once the magistrate had come and gone, he would +take as long as he pleased. + +Meanwhile the man and woman hand in hand drew nearer to the villa, but +very slowly. For, apart from the weather's hindrances, the woman's anger +had grown. She stopped, she fell down when there was no need to fall, +she wept, she struggled to free her hand, and finally, when they had +taken shelter beneath a portico, she sank down on the stone steps, and +with many oaths and many tears refused to budge a foot. Strangely +enough, it was not so much the inclemency of the night or the danger of +the enterprise which provoked this obstinacy, as some outrage and +dishonour to her figure. + +"You may talk all night," she cried between her sobs, "about O'Toole and +his beautiful German. They can go hang for me! I am only a servant, I +know. I am poor, I admit it. But poverty isn't a crime. It gives no one +the right to make a dwarf of me. No, no!"--this as Wogan bent down to +lift her from the ground--"plague on you all! I will sit here and die; +and when I am found frozen and dead perhaps you will be sorry for your +cruelty to a poor girl who wanted nothing better than to serve you." +Here Jenny was so moved by the piteousness of her fate that her tears +broke out again. She wept loudly. Wogan was in an extremity of alarm +lest someone should pass, or the people of the house be aroused. He +tried most tenderly to comfort her. She would have none of the +consolations. He took her in his arms and raised her to her feet. She +swore more loudly than she had wept, she kicked at his legs, she struck +at his head with her fist. In another moment she would surely have cried +murder. Wogan had to let her sink back upon the steps, where she fell to +whimpering. + +"I am not beautiful, I know; I never boasted that I was; but I have a +figure and limbs that a painter would die to paint. And what do you make +of me? A maggot, a thing all body like a nasty bear. Oh, curse the day +that I set out with such tyrants! A pretty figure of fun I should make +before your beautiful German, covered with mud to the knees. No, you +shall hang me first! Why couldn't O'Toole do his own work, the ninny, I +hate him! He's tall enough, the great donkey; but no, I must do it, +who am shorter, and even then not short enough for him and you, but you +must drag me through the dirt without heels!" + +Wogan let her run on; he was at his wits' end what to do. All this +turmoil, these tears, these oaths and blows, came from nothing more +serious than this, that Jenny, to make her height less remarkable, must +wear no heels. It was ludicrous, it was absurd, but none the less the +whole expedition, carried to the very point of completion, must fail, +utterly and irretrievably fail, because Jenny would not for one day go +without her heels. The Princess must remain in her prison at Innspruck; +the Chevalier must lose his wife; the exertions of Wogan and his +friends, their risks, their ingenuity, must bear no fruit because Jenny +would not show herself three inches short of her ordinary height. +O'Toole had warned him there would be a difficulty; but that the +difficulty should become an absolute hindrance, should spoil a scheme of +so much consequence, that was inconceivable. + +Yet there was Jenny sobbing her heart out on the steps not half a mile +from the villa; the minutes were passing; the inconceivable thing was +true. Wogan could have torn his hair in the rage of his despair. He +could have laughed out loudly and passionately until even on that stormy +night he brought the guard. He thought of the perils he had run, the +difficulties he had surmounted. He had outwitted the Countess de Berg +and Lady Featherstone, he had persuaded the reluctant Prince Sobieski, +he had foiled his enemies on the road to Schlestadt, he had made his +plans, he had gathered his friends, he had crept out with them from +Strasbourg, yet in the end they had come to Innspruck to be foiled +because Jenny would not go without her heels. Wogan could have wept like +Jenny. + +But he did not. On the contrary, he sat down by her side on the steps +and took her hand, gentle as a sheep. + +"You are in the right of it, Jenny," said he, in a most remorseful +voice. + +Jenny looked up. + +"Yes," he continued. "I was in the wrong. O'Toole is the most selfish +man in the whole world. Cowardly, too! But there never was a selfish man +who was not at heart a bit of a coward. Sure enough, sooner or later the +cowardice comes out. It is a preposterous thing that O'Toole should +think that you and I are going to rescue his heiress for him while he +sits at his ease by the inn fire. No; let us go back to him and tell him +to his face the selfish cowardly man he is." + +It seemed, however, that Jenny was not entirely pleased to hear her own +sentiments so frankly uttered by Mr. Wogan. Besides, he seemed to +exaggerate them, for she said with a little reluctance, "I would not say +that he was a coward." + +"But I would," exclaimed Wogan, hotly. "Moreover, I do. With all my +heart I say it. A great lubberly monster of a coward. He is envious, +too, Jenny." + +Jenny had by this time stopped weeping. + +"Why envious?" she asked with an accent of rebellion which was very much +to Wogan's taste. + +"It's as plain as the palm of my hand. Why should he make a dwarf of +you, Jenny?--for it's the truth he has done that; he has made a little +dwarf out of the finest girl in the land by robbing her of her heels." +Jenny was on the point of interrupting with some indignation, but Wogan +would not listen to her. "A dwarf," he continued, "it was your own word, +Jenny. I could say nothing to comfort you when you spoke it, for it was +so true and suitable an epithet. A little dwarf he has made of you, all +body and no legs like a bear, a dwarf-bear, of course; and why, if it is +not that he envies you your figure and is jealous of it in a mean and +discreditable way? Sure, he wants to have all the looks and to appear +quite incomparable to the eyes of his beautiful German. So he makes a +dwarf of you, a little bear dwarf--" + +Jenny, however, had heard this phrase often enough by now. She +interrupted Wogan hotly, and it seemed her anger was now as much +directed against him as it had been before against O'Toole. + +"He is not envious," said she. "A fine friend he has in you, I am +thinking. He has no need to be envious. Captain O'Toole could carry me +to the house in his arms if he wished, which is more than you could do +if you tried till midday to-morrow," and she turned her shoulder to +Wogan, who, in no way abashed by her contempt, cried triumphantly,-- + +"But he didn't wish. He let you drag through the mud and snow without +so much as a patten to keep you off the ground. Why? Tell me that, +Jenny! Why didn't he wish?" + +Jenny was silent. + +"You see, if he is not envious, he is at all events a coward," argued +Wogan, "else he would have run his own risks and come in your stead." + +"But that would not have served," cried Jenny. It was her turn now to +speak triumphantly. "How could O'Toole have run away with his heiress +and at the same time remained behind in her bed to escape suspicion, as +I am to do?" + +"I had forgotten that, to be sure," said Wogan, meekly. + +Jenny laughed derisively. + +"O'Toole is the man with the head on his shoulders," said she. + +"And a pitiful, calculating head it is," exclaimed Wogan. "Think of the +inconvenience of your position when you are discovered to-morrow. Think +of the angry uncle! O'Toole has thought of him and so keeps out of his +way. Here's a nice world, where hulking, shapeless giants like O'Toole +hide themselves from angry uncles behind a dwarf-girl's petticoats. Bah! +We will go back and kick O'Toole." + +Wogan rose to his feet. Jenny did not move; she sat and laughed +scornfully. + +"_You_ kick O'Toole! You might once, if he happened to be asleep. But he +would take you up by the scruff of the neck and the legs and beat your +face against your knees until you were dead. Besides, what do I care for +an angry uncle! I am well paid to put up with his insults." + +"Well paid!" said Wogan, with a sneer. "A hundred guineas and a damask +gown! Three hundred guineas and a gown all lace and gold tags would not +be enough. Besides, I'll wager he has not paid you a farthing. He'll +cheat you, Jenny. He's a rare bite is O'Toole. Between you and me, +Jenny, he is a beggarly fellow!" + +"He has already paid me half," cried Jenny. It was no knowledge to +Wogan, who, however, counterfeited a deal of surprise. + +"Well," said he, "he has only done it to cheat you the more easily of +the other fifty. We will go straight back and tell him that it costs +three hundred guineas, money down, and the best gown in Paris to turn a +fine figure of a girl into a dwarf-bear." + +He leaned down and took Jenny by the arm. She sprang to her feet and +twisted herself free. + +"No," she said, "you can go back if you will and show him what a good +friend you are to him. But I go on. The poor captain shall have one +person in the world, though she's only a servant, to help him when he +wants." + +Thus Wogan won the victory. But he was most careful to conceal it. He +walked by her side humble as a whipped dog. If he had to point out the +way, he did it with the most penitent air; when he offered his hand to +help her over a snow-heap and she struck it aside, he merely bowed his +head as though her contempt was well deserved. He even whispered in her +ear in a trembling voice, "Jenny, you will not say a word to O'Toole +about the remarks I made of him? He is a strong, hasty man. I know not +what might come of it." + +Jenny sneered and shrugged her shoulders. She would not speak to Wogan +any more, and so they came silently into the avenue of trees between +"The White Chamois" and the villa. The windows in the front of the villa +were dark, and through the blinding snow-storm Wogan could not have +distinguished the position of the house at all but for the red blinds of +the tavern opposite which shone out upon the night and gave the snow +falling before them a tinge of pink. Wogan crept nearer to the house and +heard the sentinel stamping in the snow. He came back to Jenny and +pointed the sentinel out to her. + +"Give me a quarter of an hour so far as you can judge. Then pass the +sentinel and go up the steps into the house. The sentinel is prepared +for your coming, and if he stops you, you must say 'Chateaudoux' in a +whisper, and he will understand. You will find the door of the house +open and a man waiting for you." + +Jenny made no answer, but Wogan was sure of her now. He left her +standing beneath the dripping trees and crept towards the side of the +house. A sentry was posted beneath her Highness's windows, and through +those windows he had to climb. He needed that quarter of an hour to +wait for a suitable moment when the sentry would be at the far end of +his beat. But that sentry was fuddling himself with a vile spirit +distilled from the gentian flower in the kitchen of "The White Chamois." +Wogan, creeping stealthily through the snow-storm, found the side of the +house unguarded. The windows on the ground floor were dark; those on the +first floor which lighted her Highness's apartments were ablaze. He +noticed with a pang of dismay that one of those lighted windows was wide +open to the storm. He wondered whether it meant that the Princess had +been removed to another lodging. He climbed on the sill of the lower +window; by the side of that window a stone pillar ran up the side of the +house to the windows on the first floor. Wogan had taken note of that +pillar months back when he was hawking chattels in Innspruck. He set his +hands about it and got a grip with his foot against the sash of the +lower window. He was just raising himself when he heard a noise above +him. He dropped back to the ground and stood in the fixed attitude of a +sentinel. + +A head appeared at the window, a woman's head. The light was behind, +within the room, so that Wogan could not see the face. But the shape of +the head, its gracious poise upon the young shoulders, the curve of the +neck, the bright hair drawn backwards from the brows,--here were marks +Wogan could not mistake. They had been present before his eyes these +many months. The head at the open window was the head of the Princess. +Wogan felt a thrill run through his blood. To a lover the sight of his +mistress is always unexpected, though he foreknows the very moment of +her coming. To Wogan the sight of his Queen had the like effect. He had +not seen her since he had left Ohlau two years before with her promise +to marry the Chevalier. It seemed to him, though for this he had lived +and worked up early and down late for so long, a miraculous thing that +he should see her now. + +She leaned forward and peered downwards into the lane. The light +streamed out, bathing her head and shoulders. Wogan could see the snow +fall upon her dark hair and whiten it; it fell, too, upon her neck, but +that it could not whiten. She leaned out into the darkness, and Wogan +set foot again upon the lower window-sill. At the same moment another +head appeared beside Clementina's, and a sharp cry rang out, a cry of +terror. Then both heads disappeared, and a heavy curtain swung across +the window, shutting the light in. + +Wogan remained motionless, his heart sinking with alarm. Had that cry +been heard? Had the wind carried it to the sentry at the door? He +waited, but no sound of running footsteps came to his ears; the cry had +been lost in the storm. He was now so near to success that dangers which +a month ago would have seemed of small account showed most menacing and +fatal. + +"It was the Princess-mother who cried out," he thought, and was reminded +that the need of persuasions was not ended for the night with the +conquest of Jenny. He had to convince the Princess-mother of his +authority without a line of Prince Sobieski's writing to support him; he +had to overcome her timidity. But he was prepared for the encounter; he +had foreseen it, and had an argument ready for the Princess-mother, +though he would have preferred to wring the old lady's neck. Her cry +might spoil everything. However, it had not been heard, and since it had +not been heard, Wogan was disposed to forgive it. + +For the window was still open, and now that the curtain was drawn no ray +of light escaped from the room to betray the man who climbed into it. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +Meanwhile within the room the Princess-mother clung to Clementina. The +terror which her sharp cry had expressed was visible in her strained and +startled face. Her eyes, bright with terror, stared at the drawn +curtain; she could not avert them; she still must gaze, fascinated by +her fears; and her dry, whispering lips were tremulous. + +"Heaven have mercy!" she whispered; "shut the window! Shut it fast!" and +as Clementina moved in surprise, she clung the closer to her daughter. +"No, do not leave me! Come away! Jesu! here are we alone,--two women!" + +"Mother," said Clementina, soothing her and gently stroking her hair, as +though she in truth was the mother and the mother her daughter, "there's +no cause for fear." + +"No cause for fear! I saw him--the sentry--he is climbing up. Ah!" and +again her voice rose to a cry as Wogan's foot grated on the +window-ledge. + +"Hush, mother! A cry will ruin us. It's not the sentinel," said +Clementina. + +Clementina was laughing, and by her laughter the Princess-mother was in +some measure reassured. + +"Who is it, then?" she asked. + +"Can you not guess?" said Clementina, incredulously. "It is so evident. +Yet I would not have you guess. It is my secret, my discovery. I'll tell +you." She heard a man behind the curtain spring lightly from the window +to the floor. She raised her voice that he might know she had divined +him. "Your sentinel is the one man who has the right to rescue me. Your +sentinel's the King." + +At that moment Wogan pushed aside the curtain. + +"No, your Highness," said he, "but the King's servant." + +The Princess-mother dropped into a chair and looked at her visitor with +despair. It was not the sentinel, to be sure, but, on the other hand, it +was Mr. Wogan, whom she knew for a very insistent man with a great +liking for his own way. She drew little comfort from Mr. Wogan's coming. + +It seemed, too, that he was not very welcome to Clementina; for she drew +back a step and in a voice which dropped and had a tremble of +disappointment, "Mr. Wogan," she said, "the King is well served;" and +she stood there without so much as offering him her hand. Wogan had not +counted on so cold a greeting, but he understood the reason, and was not +sure but what he approved of it. After all, she had encountered perils +on the King's account; she had some sort of a justification to believe +the King would do the like for her. It had not occurred to him or +indeed to anyone before; but now that he saw the chosen woman so plainly +wounded, he felt a trifle hot against his King for having disappointed +her. He set his wits to work to dispel the disappointment. + +"Your Highness, the truth is there are great matters brewing in Spain. +His Majesty was needed there most urgently. He had to decide between +Innspruck and Cadiz, and it seemed that he would honour your great +confidence in him and at the same time serve you best--" + +Clementina would not allow him to complete the sentence. Her cheek +flushed, and she said quickly,-- + +"You are right, Mr. Wogan. The King is right. Mine was a girl's thought. +I am ashamed of it;" and she frankly gave him her hand. Wogan was fairly +well pleased with his apology for his King. It was not quite the truth, +no doubt, but it had spared Clementina a trifle of humiliation, and had +re-established the King in her thoughts. He bent over her hand and would +have kissed it, but she stopped him. + +"No," said she, "an honest handclasp, if you please; for no woman can +have ever lived who had a truer friend," and Wogan, looking into her +frank eyes, was not, after all, nearly so well pleased with the untruth +he had told her. She was an uncomfortable woman to go about with shifts +and contrivances. Her open face, with its broad forehead and the clear, +steady eyes of darkest blue, claimed truth as a prerogative. The blush +which had faded from her cheeks appeared on his, and he began to babble +some foolish word about his unworthiness when the Princess-mother +interrupted him in a grudging voice,-- + +"Mr. Wogan, you were to bring a written authority from the Prince my +husband." + +Wogan drew himself up straight. + +"Your Highness," said he, with a bow of the utmost respect, "I was given +such an authority." + +The Princess-mother held out her hand. "Will you give it me?" + +"I said that I was given such an authority. But I have it no longer. I +was attacked on my way from Ohlau. There were five men against me, all +of whom desired that letter. The room was small; I could not run away; +neither had I much space wherein to resist five men. I knew that were I +killed and that letter found on me, your Highness would thereafter be +too surely guarded to make escape possible, and his Highness Prince +Sobieski would himself incur the Emperor's hostility. So when I had made +sure that those five men were joined against me, I twisted that letter +into a taper and before their faces lit my pipe with it." + +Clementina's eyes were fixed steadily and intently upon Wogan's face. +When he ended she drew a deep breath, but otherwise she did not move. +The Princess-mother, however, was unmistakably relieved. She spoke with +a kindliness she had never shown before to Wogan; she even smiled at +him in a friendly way. + +"We do not doubt you, Mr. Wogan, but that written letter, giving my +daughter leave to go, I needs must have before I let her go. A father's +authority! I cannot take that upon myself." + +Clementina took a quick step across to her mother's side. + +"You did not hear," she said. + +"I heard indeed that Mr. Wogan had burnt the letter." + +"But under what stress, and to spare my father and to leave me still a +grain of hope. Mother, this gentleman has run great risks for me,--how +great I did not know; even now in this one instance we can only guess +and still fall short of the mark." + +The Princess-mother visibly stiffened with maternal authority. + +"My child, without some sure sign the Prince consents, you must not go." + +Clementina looked towards Wogan for assistance. Wogan put his hand into +his pocket. + +"That sure sign I have," said he. "It is a surer sign than any written +letter; for handwriting may always be counterfeit. This could never be," +and he held out on the palm of his hand the turquoise snuff-box which +the Prince had given him on New Year's day. "It is a jewel unique in all +the world, and the Prince gave it me. It is a jewel he treasured not +only for its value, but its history. Yet he gave it me. It was won by +the great King John of Poland, and remains as a memorial of the most +glorious day in all that warrior's glorious life; yet his son gave it +me. With his own hands he put it into mine to prove to me with what +confidence he trusted your Highness's daughter to my care. That +confidence was written large in the letter I burnt, but I am thinking it +is engraved for ever upon this stone." + +The Princess-mother took the snuff-box reluctantly and turned it over +and over. She was silent. Clementina answered for her. + +"I am ready," she said, and she pointed to a tiny bundle on a chair in +which a few clothes were wrapped. "My jewels are packed in the bundle, +but I can leave them behind me if needs be." + +Wogan lifted up the bundle and laughed. + +"Your Highness teaches a lesson to soldiers; for there is never a +knapsack but can hold this and still have half its space to spare. The +front door is unlatched?" + +"M. Chateaudoux is watching in the hall." + +"And the hall's unlighted?" + +"Yes." + +"Jenny should be here in a minute, and before she comes I must tell you +she does not know the importance of our undertaking. She is the servant +to Mrs. Misset, who attends your Highness into Italy. We did not let her +into the secret. We made up a comedy in which you have your parts to +play. Your Highness," and he turned to Clementina, "is a rich Austrian +heiress, deeply enamoured of Captain Lucius O'Toole." + +"Captain Lucius O'Toole!" exclaimed the mother, in horror. "My daughter +enamoured of a Captain Lucius O'Toole!" + +"He is one of my three companions," said Wogan, imperturbably. +"Moreover, he is six foot four, the most creditable lover in the world." + +"Well," said Clementina, with a laugh, "I am deeply enamoured of the +engaging Captain Lucius O'Toole. Go on, sir." + +"Your parents are of a most unexampled cruelty. They will not smile upon +the fascinating O'Toole, but have locked you up on bread and water until +you shall agree to marry a wealthy but decrepit gentleman of +eighty-three." + +"I will not," cried Clementina; "I will starve myself to death first. I +will marry my six feet four or no other man in Christendom." + +"Clementina!" cried her mother, deprecatingly. + +"But at this moment," continued Wogan, "there very properly appears the +fairy godmother in the person of a romantical maiden aunt." + +"Oh!" said Clementina, "I have a romantical maiden aunt." + +"Yes," said Wogan, and turning with a bow to the Princess-mother; "your +Highness." + +"I?" she exclaimed, starting up in her chair. + +"Your Highness has written an encouraging letter to Captain O'Toole," +resumed Wogan. The Princess-mother gasped, "A letter to Captain +O'Toole," and she flung up her hands and fell back in her chair. + +"On the receipt of the letter Captain O'Toole gathers his friends, +borrows a horse here, a carriage there, and a hundred guineas from +Heaven knows whom, comes to the rescue like a knight-errant, and retells +the old story of how love laughs at locksmiths." + +As Wogan ended, the mother rose from her chair. It may have been that +she revolted at the part she was to play; it may have been because a +fiercer gust shook the curtain and bellied it inwards. At all events she +flung the curtain aside; the snow drifted through the open window onto +the floor; outside the open window it was falling like a cascade, and +the air was icy. + +"Mr. Wogan," she said, stubbornly working herself into a heat to make +more sure of her resolution, "my daughter cannot go to-night. To-morrow, +if the sky clears, yes, but to-night, no. You do not know, sir, being a +man. But my daughter has fasted through this Lent, and that leaves a +woman weak. I do forbid her going, as her father would. The very dogs +running the streets for food keep kennel on such a night. She must not +go." + +Wogan did not give way, though he felt a qualm of despair, knowing all +the stubbornness of which the weak are capable, knowing how impervious +to facts or arguments. + +"Your Highness," he said quickly, "we are not birds of passage to rule +our flight by seasons. We must take the moment when it comes, and it +comes now. To-night your daughter can escape; for here's a night made +for an escape." + +"And for my part," cried Clementina, "I would the snow fell faster." She +crossed to the open window and held out her hands to catch the flakes. +"Would they did not melt! I believe Heaven sends the snow to shelter me. +It's the white canopy spread above my head, that I may go in state to +meet my King." She stood eager and exultant, her eyes shining, her cheek +on fire, her voice thrilling with pride. She seemed not to feel the +cold. She welcomed the hardships of wind and falling snow as her +opportunity. She desired not only for escape, but also to endure. + +Wogan looked her over from head to foot, filled with pride and +admiration. He had made no mistake; he had plucked this rose of the +world to give to his King. His eyes said it; and the girl, reading them, +drew a breath and rippled out a laugh of gladness that his trusted +servant was so well content with her. But the Princess-mother stood +unmoved. + +"My daughter cannot go to-night," she repeated resentfully. "I do forbid +it." + +Wogan had his one argument. This one argument was his last resource. He +had chosen it carefully with an eye to the woman whom it was to +persuade. It was not couched as an inducement; it did not claim the +discharge of an obligation; it was not a reply to any definite +objection. Such arguments would only have confirmed her in her +stubbornness. He made accordingly an appeal to sentiment. + +"Your Highness's daughter," said he, "spoke a minute since of the +hazards my friends and I have run to compass her escape. As regards four +of us, the words reached beyond our deserts. For we are men. Such +hazards are our portion; they are seldom lightened by so high an aim. +But the fifth! The words, however kind, were still below that fifth +one's merits; for the fifth is a woman." + +"I know. With all my heart I thank her. With all my heart I pity her." + +"But there is one thing your Highness does not know. She runs our +risks,--the risk of capture, the risk of the night, the storm, the snow, +she a woman by nature timid and frail,--yet with never in all her life +so great a reason for timidity, or so much frailty of health as now. We +venture our lives, but she ventures more." + +The mother bowed her head; Clementina looked fixedly at Wogan. + +"Speak plainly, my friend," she said. "There are no children here." + +"Madam, I need but quote to you the words her husband used. For my part, +I think that nobler words were never spoken, and with her whole heart +she repeats them. They are these: 'The boy would only live to serve his +King; why should he not serve his King before he lives?'" + +The mother was still silent, but Wogan could see that the tears +overbrimmed her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. Clementina was silent +for a while too, and stood with her eyes fixed thoughtfully on Wogan. +Then she said gently,-- + +"Her name." + +Wogan told her it, and she said no more; but it was plain that she would +never forget it, that she had written it upon her heart. + +Wogan waited, looking to the Princess, who drying her tears rose from +her chair and said with great and unexpected dignity,-- + +"How comes it, sir, that with such servants your King still does not sit +upon his throne? My daughter shall not fall below the great example set +to her. My fears are shamed by it. My daughter goes with you to-night." + +It was time that she consented, for even as Wogan flung himself upon his +knee and raised her hand, M. Chateaudoux appeared at the door with a +finger on his lips, and behind him one could hear a voice grumbling and +cursing on the stairs. + +"Jenny," said Wogan, and Jenny stumbled into the room. "Quiet," said he; +"you will wake the house." + +"Well, if you had to walk upstairs in the dark in these horrible +shoes--" + +"Oh, Jenny, your cloak, quick!" + +"Take the thing! A good riddance to it; it's dripping wet, and weighs a +ton." + +"Dripping wet!" moaned the mother. + +"I shall not wear it long," said Clementina, advancing from the +embrasure of the window. Jenny turned and looked her over critically +from head to foot. Then she turned away without a word and let the cloak +fall to the ground. It fell about her feet; she kicked it viciously +away, and at the same time she kicked off one of those shoes of which +she so much complained. Jenny was never the woman to mince her language, +and to-night she was in her surliest mood. So she swore simply and +heartily, to the mother's utter astonishment and indignation. + +"Damn!" she said, hobbling across the room to the corner, whither her +shoe had fallen. "There, there, old lady; don't hold your hands to your +ears as though a clean oath would poison them!" + +The Princess-mother fell back in her chair. + +"Does she speak to me?" she asked helplessly. + +"Yes," said Wogan; and turning to Jenny, "This is the kind-hearted +aunt." + +Jenny turned to Clementina, who was picking the cloak from the floor. + +"And you are the beautiful heiress," she said sourly. "Well, if you are +going to put that wet cloak on your shoulders, I wish you joy of the +first kiss O'Toole gives you when you jump into his arms." + +The Princess-mother screamed; Wogan hastened to interfere. + +"Jenny, there's the bedroom; to bed with you!" and he took out his +watch. At once he uttered an exclamation of affright. Wogan had +miscalculated the time which he would require. It had taken longer than +he had anticipated to reach the villa against the storm; his conflict +with Jenny in the portico had consumed valuable minutes; he had been at +some pains to over-persuade the Princess-mother; Jenny herself amongst +the trees in the darkness had waited more than the quarter of an hour +demanded of her; Wogan himself, absorbed each moment in that moment's +particular business,--now bending all his wits to vanquish Jenny, now to +vanquish the Princess-mother,--even Wogan had neglected how the time +sped. He looked at his watch. It was twenty-five minutes to ten, and at +ten the magistrate would be knocking at the door. + +"I am ready," said Clementina, drawing the wet cloak about her shoulders +and its hood over her head. She barely shivered under its wet heaviness. + +"There's one more thing to be done before you go," said Wogan; but +before he could say what that one thing was, Jenny, who had now +recovered her shoe, ran across the room and took the beautiful heiress +by both hands. Jenny was impulsive by nature. The Princess-mother's +distress and Clementina's fearlessness made her suddenly ashamed that +she had spoken so sourly. + +"There, there, old lady," she said soothingly; "don't you fret. They are +very good friends your niece is going with." Then she drew Clementina +close to her. "I don't wonder they are all mad about you, for I can't +but say you are very handsome and richly worth the pains you have +occasioned us." She kissed Clementina plump upon the cheek and +whispered in her ear, "O'Toole won't mind the wet cloak, my dear, when +he sees you." + +Clementina laughed happily and returned her kiss with no less sincerity, +if with less noise. + +"Quick, Jenny," said Wogan, "to bed with you!" + +He pointed to the door which led to the Princess's bedroom. + +"Now you must write a letter," he added to Clementina, in a low voice, +as soon as the door was shut upon Jenny. "A letter to your mother, +relieving her of all complicity in your escape. Her Highness will find +it to-morrow night slipped under the cover of her toilette." + +Clementina ran to a table, and taking up a pen, "You think of +everything," she said. "Perhaps you have written the letter." + +Wogan pulled a sheet of paper from his fob. + +"I scribbled down a few dutiful sentiments," said he, "as we drove down +from Nazareth, thinking it might save time." + +"Mother," exclaimed Clementina, "not content with contriving my escape, +he will write my letters to you. Well, sir, let us hear what you have +made of it." + +Wogan dictated a most beautiful letter, in which a mother's claims for +obedience were strongly set out--as a justification, one must suppose, +for a daughter's disobedience. But Clementina was betrothed to his +Majesty King James, and that engagement must be ever the highest +consideration with her, on pain of forfeiting her honour. It was +altogether a noble and stately letter, written in formal, irreproachable +phrases which no daughter in the world would ever have written to a +mother. Clementina laughed over it, but said that it would serve. Wogan +looked at his watch again. It was then a quarter to ten. + +"Quick!" said he. "Your Highness will wait for me under the fourth tree +of the avenue, counting from the end." + +He left the mother and daughter alone, that his presence might not check +the tenderness of their farewell, and went down the stairs into the dark +hall. M. Chateaudoux was waiting there, with his teeth chattering in the +extremity of his alarm. Wogan unlatched the door very carefully and saw +through the chink the sentry standing by the steps. The snow still fell; +he was glad to note the only light was a white glimmering from the waste +of snow upon the ground. + +"You must go out with her," Wogan whispered to Chateaudoux, "and speak a +word to the sentry." + +"At any moment the magistrate may come," said Chateaudoux, though he +trembled so that he could hardly speak. + +"All the more reason for the sentinel to let your sweetheart run home at +her quickest step," said Wogan, and above him he heard Clementina come +out upon the landing. He crept up the stairs to her. + +"Here is my hand," said he, in a low voice. She laid her own in his, +and bending towards him in the darkness she whispered,-- + +"Promise me it shall always be at my service. I shall need friends. I am +young, and I have no knowledge. Promise me!" + +She was young indeed. The freshness of her voice, its little tremble of +modesty, the earnestness of its appeal, carried her youth quite home to +Mr. Wogan's heart. She was sweet with youth. Wogan felt it more clearly +as they stood together in the darkness than when he had seen her plainly +in the lighted room, with youth mantling her cheeks and visible in the +buoyancy of her walk. Then she had been always the chosen woman. Wogan +could just see her eyes, steady and mysteriously dark, shining at him +out of the gloom, and a pang of remorse suddenly struck through him. +That one step she was to take was across the threshold of a prison, it +was true, but a prison familiar and warm, and into a night of storm and +darkness and ice. The road lay before her into Italy, but it was a road +of unknown perils, through mountains deep in snow. And this escape of +to-night from the villa, this thunderous flight, with its hardships and +its dangers, which followed the escape, was only the symbol of her life. +She stepped from the shelter of her girlhood, as she stepped across the +threshold of the villa, into a womanhood dark with many trials, +storm-swept and wandering. She might reach the queendom which was her +due, as the berlin in which she was to travel might--nay, surely +would--rush one day from the gorges into the plains and the sunlight of +Italy; but had Wogan travelled to Rome in Gaydon's place and talked with +Whittington outside the Caprara Palace, it is very likely that she would +never have been allowed by him to start. Up till now he had thought only +of her splendid courage, of the humiliation of her capture, of her +wounded pride; she was the chosen woman. Now he thought of the girl, and +wondered of her destiny, and was stricken with remorse. + +"Promise me," she repeated, and her hand tightened upon his and clung to +it. Wogan had no fine sentiments wherewith to answer her; but his voice +took a depth of sincerity and tenderness quite strange to her. Her +fingers ceased to tremble. + +They went down into the hall. Chateaudoux, who had been waiting in an +agony of impatience, opened the door and slipped out; Clementina +followed him. + +The door was left ajar behind them, and Wogan in the hall saw +Chateaudoux speak with the sentinel, saw the sentinel run hurriedly to +Clementina, saw Clementina disappear into the snow. Chateaudoux ran back +into the hall. + +"And you!" he asked, as he barred and locked the door. "The magistrate +is coming. I saw the lights of the guard across the avenue." + +Clementina was outside in the storm; Wogan was within the house, and the +lights of the guard were already near. + +"I go by the way I came," said he; "I have time;" and he ran quickly up +the stairs. In the room he found the Princess-mother weeping silently, +and again, as he saw this weak elderly woman left alone to her fears and +forebodings, remorse took hold on him. + +"Courage, madam," said he, as he crossed the room; "she goes to wed a +king." + +"Sir, I am her mother," replied the Princess, gaining at this moment a +suitable dignity from her tears. "I was wondering not of the King, but +of the man the King conceals." + +"You need not, madam," said Wogan, who had no time for eulogies upon his +master. "Take his servant's loyalty as the measure of his merits." + +He looked out of the window and suddenly drew back. He stood for a +moment with a look of great fear upon his face. For the sentinel was +back at his post; Wogan dared not at this moment risk a struggle, and +perhaps an outcry. Clementina was waiting under the avenue of trees; +Wogan was within the house, and the lights of the guard were already +flaring in the roadway. Even as Wogan stood in the embrasure of the +window, he heard a heavy knocking on the door. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +Wogan closed the window cautiously. The snow had drifted through and lay +melting in a heap beneath the sill. He drew the curtain across the +embrasure, and then he crossed to the bedroom door. + +"Jenny," he whispered, "are you in bed?" + +"Yes." + +"Lie close! Do not show your face nor speak. Only groan, and groan most +delicately, or we are lost." + +He closed the door upon Jenny, and turning about came face to face with +the Princess-mother. She stood confronting him, a finger on her lips, +and terror in her eyes; and he heard the street-door open and clang to +below. + +"The magistrate!" she whispered. + +"Courage, your Highness. Keep them from the bed! Say that her eyes are +weak and cannot bear the light." + +He slipped behind the curtain into the embrasure, picturing to himself +the disposition of the room, lest he should have left behind a trifle to +betray him. He had in a supreme degree that gift of recollection which +takes the form of a mental vision. He did not have to count over the +details of the room; he summoned a picture of it to his mind, and saw +it and its contents from corner to corner. And thus while the footsteps +yet sounded on the stair, he saw Clementina's bundle lying forgotten on +a couch. He darted from his hiding-place, seized it, and ran back. He +had just sufficient and not a second more time, for the curtain had not +ceased to swing when the magistrate knocked, and without waiting for an +answer entered. He was followed by two soldiers, and these he ordered to +wait without the door. + +"Your Highness," he said in a polite voice, and stopped abruptly. It +seemed to Wogan behind the curtain that his heart stopped at the same +moment and with no less abruptness. There was no evidence of +Clementina's flight to justify that sudden silence. Then he grew faint, +as it occurred to him that he had made Lady Featherstone's +mistake,--that his boot protruded into the room. He clenched his teeth, +expecting a swift step and the curtain to be torn aside. The window was +shut; he would never have time to open it and leap out and take his +chance with the sentry underneath. He was caught in a trap, and +Clementina waited for him in the avenue, under the fourth tree. All was +lost, it seemed, and by his own folly, his own confidence. Had he only +told her of the tavern under the city wall, where the carriage stood +with its horses harnessed in the shafts, she might still have escaped, +though he was trapped. The sweat passed down his face. Yet no swift step +was taken, nor was the curtain torn aside. + +For within the room the magistrate, a kindly citizen of Innspruck who +had no liking for this addition to his duties, stood gazing at the +Princess-mother with a respectful pity. It was the sight of her +tear-stained face which had checked his words. For two days Clementina +had kept her bed, and the mother's tears alarmed him. + +"Her Highness, your daughter, suffers so much?" said he. + +"Sir, it is little to be wondered at." + +The magistrate bowed. That question was not one with which he had a mind +to meddle. + +"She still lies in bed?" said he, and he crossed to the door. The mother +flung herself in the way. + +"She lies in pain, and you would disturb her; you would flash your +lanterns in her eyes, that if perchance she sleeps, she may wake into a +world of pain. Sir, you will not." + +"Your Highness--" + +"It is the mother who beseeches you. Sir, would you have me on my +knees?" + +Wogan, but this moment recovered from his alarm, became again uneasy. +Her Highness protested too much; she played her part in the comedy too +strenuously. He judged by the ear; the magistrate had the quivering, +terror-stricken face before his eyes, and his pity deepened. + +"Your Highness," he said, "I must pray you to let me pass. I have +General Heister's orders to obey." + +The Princess-mother now gave Wogan reason to applaud her. She saw that +the magistrate, for all his politeness, was quite inflexible. + +"Go, then," she said with a quiet dignity which once before she had +shown that evening. "Since there is no humiliation to be spared us, take +a candle, sir, and count the marks of suffering in my daughter's face;" +and with her own hand she opened the bedroom door and stood aside. + +"Madam, I would not press my duty an inch beyond its limits," said the +magistrate. "I will stand in the doorway, and do you bid your daughter +speak." + +The Princess-mother did not move from her position. + +"My child," she said. + +Jenny in the bedroom groaned and turned from one side to the other. + +"You are in pain?" + +Jenny groaned again. The magistrate himself closed the door. + +"Believe me," said he, "no one could more regret than I the incivilities +to which I am compelled." + +He crossed the room. Wogan heard him and his men descending the stairs. +He heard the door open and shut; he heard Chateaudoux draw the bolts. +Then he stepped out from the curtain. + +"Your Highness, that was bravely done," said he, and kneeling he kissed +her hand. He went back into the embrasure, slipped the bundle over his +arm, and opened the window very silently. He saw the snow was still +falling, the wind still moaning about the crannies and roaring along +the streets. He set his knee upon the window-ledge, climbed out, and +drew the window to behind him. + +The Princess-mother waited in the room with her hand upon her heart. She +waited, it seemed to her, for an eternity. Then she heard the sound of a +heavy fall, and the clang of a musket against the wall of the villa. But +she heard no cry. She ran to the window and looked out. But strain her +eyes as she might, she could distinguish nothing in that blinding storm. +She could not see the sentinel; nor was this strange, for the sentinel +lay senseless on the snow against the house-wall, and Mr. Wogan was +already running down the avenue. + +Under the fourth tree he found Clementina; she took his arm, and they +set off together, wrestling with the wind, wading through the snow. It +seemed to Clementina that her companion was possessed by some new fear. +He said no single word to her; he dragged her with a fierce grip upon +her wrist; if she stumbled, he jerked her roughly to her feet. She set +her teeth and kept pace with him. Only once did she speak. They had come +to a depression in the road where the melted snow had made a wide pool. +Wogan leaped across it and said,-- + +"Give me your hand! There's a white stone midway where you can set your +foot." + +The Princess stepped as he bade her. The stone yielded beneath her tread +and she stood ankle-deep in the water. Wogan sprang to her side and +lifted her out. She had uttered no cry, and now she only laughed as she +stood shivering on the further edge. It was that low musical, +good-humoured laugh to which Wogan had never listened without a thrill +of gladness, but it waked no response in him now. + +"You told me of a white stone on which I might safely set my foot," she +said. "Well, sir, your white stone was straw." + +They were both to remember these words afterwards and to make of them a +parable, but it seemed that Wogan barely heard them now. "Come!" he +said, and taking her arm he set off running again. + +Clementina understood that something inopportune, something terrible, +had happened since she had left the villa. She asked no questions; she +trusted herself without reserve to these true friends who had striven at +such risks for her, she desired to prove to them that she was what they +would have her be,--a girl who did not pester them with inconvenient +chatter, but who could keep silence when silence was helpful, and face +hardships with a buoyant heart. + +They crossed the bridge and stopped before a pair of high folding doors. +They were the doors of the tavern. Wogan drew a breath of relief, pulled +the bobbin, and pushed the doors open. Clementina slipped through, and +in darkness she took a step forward and bruised herself against the +wheels of a carriage. Wogan closed the door and ran to her side. + +"This way," said he, and held out his hand. He guided Clementina round +the carriage to a steep narrow stairway--it was more a ladder than a +stair--fixed against the inner wall. At the top of this stairway shone a +horizontal line of yellow light. Wogan led the Princess up the stairs. +The line of light shone out beneath a door. Wogan opened the door and +stood aside. Clementina passed into a small bare room lighted by a +single candle, where Mrs. Misset, Gaydon, and O'Toole waited for her +coming. Not a word was said; but their eyes spoke their admiration of +the woman, their knees expressed their homage to the Queen. There was a +fire blazing on the hearth, Mrs. Misset had a dry change of clothes +ready and warm. Wogan laid the Princess's bundle on a chair, and with +Gaydon and O'Toole went down the stairs. + +"The horses?" he asked. + +"I have ordered them," said Gaydon, "at the post-house. I will fetch +them;" and he hurried off upon his errand. + +Wogan turned to O'Toole. + +"And the bill?" + +"I have paid it." + +"There is no one awake in the house?" + +"No one but the landlady." + +"Good! Can you keep her engaged until we are ready?" + +"To be sure I can. She shall never give a thought to any man of you but +myself." + +O'Toole passed through a door at the bottom of the staircase into the +common-room of the inn. Wogan gently opened the big doors and dragged +the carriage out into the road. Gaydon with the horses galloped +silently up through the snow, and together the two men feverishly +harnessed them to the carriage. There were six for the carriage, and a +seventh for O'Toole to ride. The expedition which Wogan and Gaydon +showed was matched by the Princess. For while they were fastening the +last buckles, the door at the top of the stairs opened, and again that +night Clementina whispered,-- + +"I am ready." + +"Come!" replied Wogan. She wore a scarlet cloak upon her shoulders, and +muffling it about her head she ran down with Mrs. Misset. Wogan opened +the lower door of the inn and called for O'Toole. O'Toole came running +out before Wogan had ended his words, and sprang into his saddle. Gaydon +was already on the box with the reins gathered in his hand. Wogan had +the carriage door open before Clementina had reached the foot of the +stairs; it was shut upon her and her companion almost before they were +aware they were within it; the carriage started almost before the door +was shut. Yet when it did start, Wogan was beside Gaydon upon the box. +Their movements, indeed, occurred with so exact a rapidity, that though +the hostess at once followed O'Toole to bid her guests farewell, when +she reached the big doors she saw only the back of the carriage lurching +through the ruts of snow. + +"Quick!" cried Wogan; "we have lost too much time." + +"A bare twenty minutes," said Gaydon. + +"A good twelve hours," said Wogan. + +Gaydon lashed the horses into a gallop, the horses strained at their +collars, the carriage raced out of the town and up the slopes of the +Brenner. The princess Clementina had been rescued from her prison. + +"But we must keep her free!" cried Wogan, as he blew through his gloves +upon his frozen fingers. "Faster! Faster!" + +The incline was steep, the snow clogged the wheels, the horses sank deep +in it. Gaydon might ply his whip as he would, the carriage might lurch +and leap from side to side; the pace was all too slow for Wogan. + +"We have lost twelve hours," he cried. "Oh, would to God we were come to +Italy!" And turning backwards he strained his eyes down through the +darkness and snow to the hidden roofs of Innspruck, almost fearing to +see the windows from one end of the town to the other leap to a blaze of +light, and to hear a roar of many voices warn him that the escape was +discovered. But the only cry that he heard came from the lips of Mrs. +Misset, who put her head from the carriage and bade him stop. + +Gaydon brought the horses to a standstill three miles out of Innspruck. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +Wogan jumped down from his box and ran to the carriage-door. + +"Her Highness is ill?" he cried in suspense. + +"Not the least bit in the world," returned Clementina, whose voice for +once in a way jarred upon Wogan's ears. Nothing short of a positive +sickness could justify the delay. + +"What is it, then?" he asked curtly, almost roughly, of Mrs. Misset. + +"You carried a packet for her Highness. It is left behind at the +tavern." + +Wogan stamped impatiently on the ground. + +"And for this, for a petticoat or two, you hinder us," he cried in a +heat. "There's no petticoat in the world, though it were so stiff with +gold that it stood on end of itself, that's worth a single second of the +next forty-eight hours." + +"But it contains her Highness's jewels." + +Wogan's impatience became an exasperation. Were all women at heart, +then, no better than Indian squaws? A string of beads outweighed the +sacrifices of friends and the chance of a crown! There was a blemish in +his idol, since at all costs she must glitter. Wogan, however, was the +master here. + +"Her Highness must lose her jewels," he said roughly, and was turning +away when her Highness herself spoke. + +"You are unjust, my friend," she said. "I would lose them very +willingly, were there a chance no one else would discover them. But +there's no chance. The woman of the tavern will find the bundle, will +open it; very likely she has done so already. We shall have all +Innspruck on our heels in half an hour;" and for the first time that +night Wogan heard her voice break, and grieved to know that the tears +were running down her cheeks. He called to O'Toole,-- + +"Ride back to the tavern! Bring the packet without fail!" + +O'Toole galloped off, and Gaydon drove the carriage to the side of the +road. There was nothing to do but to wait, and they waited in silence, +counting up the chances. There could be no doubt that the landlady, if +once she discovered the jewels hidden away in a common packet of +clothing, must suspect the travellers who had left them behind. She +would be terrified by their value; she would be afraid to retain them +lest harm should come to her; and all Innspruck would be upon the +fugitives' heels. They waited for half an hour,--thirty minutes of gloom +and despair. Clementina wept over this new danger which her comrades +ran; Mrs. Misset wept for that her negligence was to blame; Gaydon sat +on the box in the falling snow with his arms crossed upon his breast, +and felt his head already loose upon his shoulders. The only one of the +party who had any comfort of that half-hour was Wogan. For he had been +wrong,--the chosen woman had no wish to glitter at all costs, though, to +be sure, she could not help glittering with the refulgence of her great +merits. His idol had no blemish. Wogan paced up and down the road, while +he listened for O'Toole's return, and that thought cheated the time for +him. At last he heard very faintly the sound of galloping hoofs below +him on the road. He ran back to Gaydon. + +"It might be a courier to arrest us. If I shout, drive fast as you can +to Nazareth, and from Nazareth to Italy." + +He hurried down the road and was hailed by O'Toole. + +"I have it," said he. Wogan turned and ran by O'Toole's stirrup to the +carriage. + +"The landlady has a good conscience and sleeps well," said O'Toole. "I +found the house dark and the doors shut. They were only secured, +however, by a wooden beam dropped into a couple of sockets on the +inside." + +"But how did you open them?" asked Clementina. + +"Your Highness, I have, after all, a pair of arms," said O'Toole. "I +just pressed on the doors till--" + +"Till the sockets gave?" + +"No, till the beam broke," said he, and Clementina laughed. + +"That's my six foot four!" said she. O'Toole did not understand. But he +smiled with great condescension and dignity, and continued his story. + +"I groped my way up the stairs into the room and found the bundle +untouched in the corner." + +He handed it to the Princess; Wogan sprang again onto the box, and +Gaydon whipped up the horses. They reached the first posting stage at +two, the second at four, the third at six, and at each they wasted no +time. All that night their horses strained up the mountain road amid the +whirling sleet. At times the wind roaring down a gorge would set the +carriage rocking; at times they stuck fast in drifts; and Wogan and +Gaydon must leap from the box and plunging waist-deep in the snow, must +drag at the horses and push at the wheels. The pace was too slow; Wogan +seemed to hear on every gust of wind the sound of a galloping company. + +"We have lost twelve hours, more than twelve hours now," he repeated and +repeated to Gaydon. All the way to Ala they would still be in the +Emperor's territory. It needed only a single courier to gallop past +them, and at either Roveredo or Trent they would infallibly be taken. +Wogan fingered his pistols, straining his eyes backwards down the road. + +At daybreak the snow stopped; the carriage rolled on high among the +mountains under a grey sky; and here and there, at a wind of the road, +Wogan caught a glimpse of the towers and chimney-tops of Innspruck, or +had within his view a stretch of the slope they had climbed. But there +was never a black speck visible upon the white of the snow; as yet no +courier was overtaking them, as yet Innspruck did not know its captive +had escaped. At eight o'clock in the morning they came to Nazareth, and +found their own berlin ready harnessed at the post-house door, the +postillion already in his saddle, and Misset waiting with an uncovered +head. + +"Her Highness will breakfast here, no doubt?" said Gaydon. + +"Misset will have seen to it," cried Wogan, "that the berlin is +furnished. We can breakfast as we go." + +They waited no more than ten minutes at Nazareth. The order of +travelling was now changed. Wogan and Gaydon now travelled in the berlin +with Mrs. Misset and Clementina. Gaydon, being the oldest of the party, +figured as the Count of Cernes, Mrs. Misset as his wife, Clementina as +his niece, and Wogan as a friend of the family. O'Toole and Misset rode +beside the carriage in the guise of servants. Thus they started from +Nazareth, and had journeyed perhaps a mile when without so much as a +moan Clementina swooned and fell forward into Wogan's arms. Mrs. Misset +uttered a cry; Wogan clasped the Princess to his breast. Her head fell +back across his arm, pale as death; her eyes were closed; her bosom, +strained against his, neither rose nor fell. + +"She has fasted all Lent," he said in a broken voice. "She has eaten +nothing since we left Innspruck." + +Mrs. Misset burst into tears; she caught Clementina's hand and clasped +it; she had no eyes but for her. With Gaydon it was different. Wogan was +holding the Princess in a clasp too loverlike, though, to be sure, it +was none of his business. + +"We must stop the carriage," he said. + +"No," cried Wogan, desperately; "that we must not do;" and he caught her +still closer to him. He had a fear that she was dying. Even so, she +should not be recaptured. Though she were dead, he would still carry her +dead body into Bologna and lay it white and still before his King. +Europe from London to the Bosphorus should know the truth of her and +ring with the wonder of her, though she were dead. O'Toole, attracted by +the noise of Mrs. Misset's lamentations, bent down over his horse's neck +and looked into the carriage. + +"Her Highness is dead!" he cried. + +"Drive on," replied Wogan, through his clenched teeth. + +Upon the other side of the carriage, Misset shouted through the window, +"There is a spring by the roadside." + +"Drive on," said Wogan. + +Gaydon touched him on the arm. + +"You will stifle her, man." + +Wogan woke to a comprehension of his attitude, and placed Clementina +back on her seat. Mrs. Misset by good fortune had a small bottle of +Carmelite water in her pocket; she held it to the Princess's nostrils, +who in a little opened her eyes and saw her companions in tears about +her, imploring her to wake. + +"It is nothing," she said. "Take courage, my poor marmosets;" and with a +smile she added, "There's my six feet four with the tears in his eyes. +Did ever a woman have such friends?" + +The sun came out in the sky as she spoke. They had topped the pass and +were now driving down towards Italy. There was snow about them still on +the mountain-sides and deep in drifts upon the roads. The air was +musical with the sound of innumerable freshets: they could be seen +leaping and sparkling in the sunlight; the valleys below were green with +the young green of spring, and the winds were tempered with the warmth +of Italy. A like change came upon the fugitives. They laughed, where +before they had wept; from under the seat they pulled out chickens which +Misset had cooked with his own hands at Nazareth, bottles of the wine of +St. Laurent, and bread; and Wogan allowed a halt long enough to get +water from a spring by the roadside. + +"There is no salt," said Gaydon. + +"Indeed there is," replied Misset, indignant at the aspersion on his +catering. "I have it in my tobacco-box." He took his tobacco-box from +his pocket and passed it into the carriage. Clementina made sandwiches +and passed them out to the horsemen. The chickens turned out to be old +cocks, impervious to the soundest tooth. No one minded except Misset, +who had brought them. The jolts of the carriage became matter for a +jest. They picnicked with the merriment of children, and finally +O'Toole, to show his contempt for the Emperor, fired off both his loaded +pistols in the air. + +At that Wogan's anxiety returned. He blazed up into anger. He thrust his +head from the window. + +"Is this your respect for her Highness?" he cried. "Is this your +consideration?" + +"Nay," interposed Clementina, "you shall not chide my six feet four." + +"But he is mad, your Highness. I don't say but what a trifle of madness +is salt to a man; but O'Toole's clean daft to be firing his pistols off +to let the whole world know who we are. Here are we not six stages from +Innspruck, and already we have lost twelve hours." + +"When?" + +"Last night, before we left Innspruck, between the time when you escaped +from the villa and when I joined you in the avenue. I climbed out of the +window to descend as I had entered, but the sentinel had returned. I +waited on the window-ledge crouched against the wall until he should +show me his back. After five minutes or so he did. He stamped on the +snow and marched up the lane. I let myself down and hung by my hands, +but he turned on his beat before I could drop. He marched back; I clung +to the ledge, thinking that in the darkness he would pass on beneath me +and never notice. He did not notice; but my fingers were frozen and +numbed with the cold. I felt them slipping; I could cling no longer, and +I fell. Luckily I fell just as he passed beneath me; I dropped feet +foremost upon his shoulders, and he went down without a cry. I left him +lying stunned there on the snow; but he will be found, or he will +recover. Either way our escape will be discovered, and no later than +this morning. Nay, it must already have been discovered. Already +Innspruck's bells are ringing the alarm; already the pursuit is +begun--" and he leaned his head from the window and cried, "Faster! +faster!" O'Toole, for his part, shouted, "Trinkgeldt!" It was the only +word of German which he knew. "But," said he, "there was a Saracen lady +I learned about at school who travelled over Europe and found her lover +in an alehouse in London, with no word but his name to help her over the +road. Sure, it would be a strange thing if I couldn't travel all over +Germany with the help of 'Trinkgeldt.'" + +The word certainly had its efficacy with the postillion. "Trinkgeldt!" +cried O'Toole, and the berlin rocked and lurched and leaped down the +pass. The snow was now less deep, the drifts fewer. The road wound along +a mountain-side: at one window rose the rock; from the other the +travellers looked down hundreds of feet to the bed of the valley and the +boiling torrent of the Adige. It was a mere narrow ribbon of a road made +by the Romans, without a thought for the convenience of travellers in a +later day; and as the carriage turned a corner, O'Toole, mounted on his +horse, saw ahead a heavy cart crawling up towards them. The carter saw +the berlin thundering down towards him behind its four maddened horses, +and he drew his cart to the inside of the road against the rock. The +postillion tugged at his reins; he had not sufficient interval of space +to check his team; he threw a despairing glance at O'Toole. It seemed +impossible the berlin could pass. There was no use to cry out; O'Toole +fell behind the carriage with his mind made up. He looked down the +precipice; he saw in his imagination the huge carriage with its tangled, +struggling horses falling sheer into the foam of the river. He could not +ride back to Bologna with that story to tell; he and his horse must take +the same quick, steep road. + +The postillion drove so close to the cart that he touched it as he +passed. "We are lost!" he shouted in an agony; and O'Toole saw the hind +wheel of the berlin slip off the road and revolve for the fraction of a +second in the air. He was already putting his horse at the precipice as +though it was a ditch to be jumped, when the berlin made, to his +astonished eyes, an effort to recover its balance like a live thing. It +seemed to spring sideways from the brink of the precipice. It not only +seemed, it did spring; and O'Toole, drawing rein, in the great revulsion +of his feelings, saw, as he rocked unsteadily in his saddle, the +carriage tearing safe and unhurt down the very centre of the road. + +O'Toole set his spurs to his horse and galloped after it. The postillion +looked back and laughed. + +"Trinkgeldt!" he cried. + +O'Toole swore loudly, and getting level beat him with his whip. Wogan's +head popped out of the window. + +"Silence!" said he in a rage. "Mademoiselle is asleep;" and then seeing +O'Toole's white and disordered face he asked, "What is it?" No one in +the coach had had a suspicion of their danger. But O'Toole still saw +before his eyes that wheel slip over the precipice and revolve in air, +he still felt his horse beneath him quiver and refuse this leap into +air. In broken tones he gasped out his story to Wogan, and as he spoke +the Princess stirred. + +"Hush!" said Wogan; "she need not know. Ride behind, O'Toole! Your blue +eyes are green with terror. Your face will tell the story, if once she +sees it." + +O'Toole fell back again behind the carriage, and at four that afternoon +they stopped before the post-house at Brixen. They had crossed the +Brenner in a storm of snow and howling winds; they had travelled ten +leagues from Innspruck. Wogan called a halt of half an hour. The +Princess had eaten barely a mouthful since her supper of the night +before. Wogan forced her to alight, forced her to eat a couple of eggs, +and to drink a glass of wine. Before the half-hour had passed, she was +anxious to start again. + +From Brixen the road was easier; and either from the smoothness of the +travelling or through some partial relief from his anxieties, Wogan, who +had kept awake so long, suddenly fell fast asleep, and when he woke up +again the night was come. He woke up without a start or even a movement, +as was his habit, and sat silently and bitterly reproaching himself for +that he had yielded to fatigue. It was pitch-dark within the carriage; +he stared through the window and saw dimly the moving mountain-side, and +here and there a clump of trees rush past. The steady breathing of +Gaydon, on his left, and of Mrs. Misset in the corner opposite to +Gaydon, showed that those two guardians slept as well. His reproaches +became more bitter and then suddenly ceased, for over against him in the +darkness a young, fresh voice was singing very sweetly and very low. It +was the Princess Clementina, and she sang to herself, thinking all three +of her companions were asleep. Wogan had not caught the sound at first +above the clatter of the wheels, and even now that he listened it came +intermittently to his ears. He heard enough, however, to know and to +rejoice that there was no melancholy in the music. The song had the +clear bright thrill of the blackbird's note in June. Wogan listened, +entranced. He would have given worlds to have written the song with +which Clementina solaced herself in the darkness, to have composed the +melody on which her voice rose and sank. + +The carriage drew up at an inn; the horses were changed; the flight was +resumed. Wogan had not moved during this delay, neither had Misset nor +O'Toole come to the door. But an ostler had flashed a lantern into the +berlin, and for a second the light had fallen upon Wogan's face and +open eyes. Clementina, however, did not cease; she sang on until the +lights had been left behind and the darkness was about them. Then she +stopped and said,-- + +"How long is it since you woke?" + +Wogan was taken by surprise. + +"I should never have slept at all," stammered he. "I promised myself +that. Not a wink of sleep betwixt Innspruck and Italy; and here was I +fast as a log this side of Trent. I think our postillion sleeps too;" +and letting down the window he quietly called Misset. + +"We have fresh relays," said he, "and we travel at a snail's-pace." + +"The relays are only fresh to us," returned Misset. "We can go no +faster. There is someone ahead with three stages' start of us,--someone +of importance, it would seem, and who travels with a retinue, for he +takes all the horses at each stage." + +Wogan thrust his head out of the window. There was no doubt of it; the +horses lagged. In this hurried flight the most trifling hindrance was a +monumental danger, and this was no trifling hindrance. For the hue and +cry was most certainly raised behind them; the pursuit from Innspruck +had begun twelve hours since, on the most favourable reckoning. At any +moment they might hear the jingle of a horse's harness on the road +behind. And now here was a man with a great retinue blocking their way +in front. + +"We can do no more, but make a fight of it in the end," said he. "They +may be few who follow us. But who is he ahead?" + +Misset did not know. + +"I can tell you," said Clementina, with a slight hesitation. "It is the +Prince of Baden, and he travels to Italy." + +Wogan remembered a certain letter which his King had written to him from +Rome; and the hesitation in the girl's voice told him the rest of the +story. Wogan would have given much to have had his fingers about the +scruff of that pompous gentleman's neck with the precipice handy at his +feet. It was intolerable that the fellow should pester the Princess in +prison and hinder her flight when she had escaped from it. + +"Well, we can do no more," said he, and he drew up the window. Neither +Gaydon nor Mrs. Misset were awakened; Clementina and Wogan were alone in +the darkness. + +She leaned forward to him and said in a low voice,-- + +"Tell me of the King. I shall make mistakes in this new world. Will he +have patience with me while I learn?" + +She had spoken upon the same strain in the darkness of the staircase +only the night before. Wogan gently laughed her fears aside. + +"I will tell you the truest thing about the King. He needs you at his +side. For all his friends, he is at heart a lonely man, throned upon +sorrows. I dare to tell you that, knowing you. He needs not a mere +wife, but a mate, a helpmate, to strive with him, her hand in his. Every +man needs the helpmate, as I read the world. For it cannot but be that a +man falls below himself when he comes home always to an empty room." + +The Princess was silent. Wogan hoped that he had reassured her. But her +thoughts were now turned from herself. She leaned yet further forward +with her elbows upon her knees, and in a yet lower voice she asked a +question which fairly startled him. + +"Does she not love you?" + +Wogan, indeed, had spoken unconsciously, with a deep note of sadness in +his voice, which had sounded all the more strange and sad to her from +its contrast with the quick, cheerful, vigorous tones she had come to +think the mark of him. He had spoken as though he looked forward with a +poignant regret through a weary span of days, and saw himself always in +youth and middle years and age coming home always to an empty room. +Therefore she put her question, and Wogan was taken off his guard. + +"There is no one," he said in a flurry. + +Clementina shook her head. + +"I wish that I may hear the King speak so, and in that voice; I shall be +very sure he loves me," she said in a musing voice, and so changing +almost to a note of raillery. "Tell me her name!" she pleaded. "What is +amiss with her that she is not thankful for a true man's love like +yours? Is she haughty? I'll bring her on her knees to you. Does she +think her birth sets her too high in the world? I'll show her so much +contempt, you so much courtesy, that she shall fall from her arrogance +and dote upon your steps. Perhaps she is too sure of your devotion? Why, +then, I'll make her jealous!" + +Wogan interrupted her, and the agitation of his voice put an end to her +raillery. Somehow she had wounded him who had done so much for her. + +"Madam, I beg you to believe me, there is no one;" and casting about for +a sure argument to dispel her conjectures, he said on an impulse, +"Listen; I will make your Highness a confidence." He stopped, to make +sure that Gaydon and Mrs. Misset were still asleep. Then he laughed +uneasily like a man that is half-ashamed and resumed,--"I am lord and +king of a city of dreams. Here's the opening of a fairy tale, you will +say. But when I am asleep my city's very real; and even now that I am +awake I could draw you a map of it, though I could not name its streets. +That's my town's one blemish. Its streets are nameless. It has taken a +long while in the building, ever since my boyhood; and indeed the work's +not finished yet, nor do I think it ever will be finished till I die, +since my brain's its architect. When I was asleep but now, I discovered +a new villa, and an avenue of trees, and a tavern with red blinds which +I had never remarked before. At the first there was nothing but a queer +white house of which the original has fallen to ruins at Rathcoffey in +Ireland. This house stood alone in a wide flat emerald plain that +stretched like an untravelled sea to a circle of curving sky. There was +room to build, you see, and when I left Rathcoffey and became a +wanderer, the building went on apace. There are dark lanes there from +Avignon between great frowning houses, narrow climbing streets from +Meran, arcades from Verona, and a park of many thickets and tall +poplar-trees with a long silver stretch of water. One day you will see +that park from the windows of St. James. It has a wall too, my city,--a +round wall enclosing it within a perfect circle; and from whatever +quarter of the plain you come towards it, you only see this wall, +there's not so much as a chimney visible above it. Once you have crowded +with the caravans and traders through the gates,--for my town is +busy,--you are at once in the ringing streets. I think my architect in +that took Aigues Mortes for his model. Outside you have the flat, silent +plain, across which the merchants creep in long trailing lines, within +the noise of markets, the tramp of horses' hoofs, the talk of men and +women, and, if you listen hard, the whispers, too, of lovers. Oh, my +city's populous! There are quiet alleys with windows opening onto them, +where on summer nights you may see a young girl's face with the +moonlight on it like a glory, and in the shadow of the wall beneath, the +cloaked figure of a youth. Well, I have a notion--" and then he broke +off abruptly. "There's a black horse I own, my favourite horse." + +"You rode it the first time you came to Ohlau," said the Princess. + +"Do you indeed remember that?" cried Wogan, with so much pleasure that +Gaydon stirred in his corner, and Clementina said, "Hush!" + +Wogan waited in a suspense lest Gaydon should wake up, which, to be +sure, would be the most inconsiderate thing in the world. Gaydon, +however, settled himself more comfortably, and in a little his regular +breathing might be heard again. + +"Well," resumed Wogan, "I have a notion that the lady I shall marry will +come riding some sunrise on my black horse across the plain and into my +city of dreams. And she has not." + +"Ah," said Clementina, "here's a subterfuge, my friend. The lady you +shall marry, you say. But tell me this! Has the lady you love ridden on +your black horse into your city of dreams?" + +"No," said Wogan; "for there is no lady whom I love." There Wogan should +have ended, but he added rather sadly, "Nor is there like to be." + +"Then I am sure," said Clementina. + +"Sure that I speak truth?" + +"No, sure that you mislead me. It is not kind; for here perhaps I might +give you some small token of my gratitude, would you but let me. Oh, it +is no matter. I shall find out who the lady is. You need not doubt it. I +shall set my wits and eyes to work. There shall be marriages when I am +Queen. I will find out!" + +Wogan's face was not visible in the darkness; but he spoke quickly and +in a startled voice,-- + +"That you must never do. Promise that you never will! Promise me that +you will never try;" and again Gaydon stirred in his corner. + +Clementina made no answer to the passionate words. She did not promise, +but she drew a breath, and then from head to foot she shivered. Wogan +dared not repeat his plea for a promise, but he felt that though she had +not given it, none the less she would keep it. They sat for awhile +silent. Then Clementina came back to her first question. + +"Tell me of the King," she said very softly. And as the carriage rolled +down the mountain valley through the night and its wheels struck flashes +of fire from the stones, Wogan drew a picture for her of the man she was +to marry. It was a relief to him to escape from the dangerous talk of +the last hour, and he spoke fervently. The poet in him had always been +sensitive to the glamour of that wandering Prince; he had his +countrymen's instinctive devotion for a failing cause. This was no +suitable moment for dwelling upon the defects and weaknesses. Wogan told +her the story of the campaign in Scotland, of the year's residence in +Avignon. He spoke most burningly. A girl would no doubt like to hear of +her love's achievements; and if James Stuart had not so many to his name +as a man could wish, that was merely because chance had served him ill. +So a fair tale was told, not to be found in any history book, of a +night attack in Scotland and how the Chevalier de St. George, surprised +and already to all purposes a prisoner, forced a way alone through nine +grenadiers with loaded muskets and escaped over the roof-tops. It was a +good breathless story as he told it, and he had just come to an end of +it when the carriage drove through the village of Wellishmile and +stopped at the posting-house. Wogan opened the door and shook Gaydon by +the shoulder. + +"Let us try if we can get stronger horses here," said he, and he got +out. Gaydon woke up with surprising alacrity. + +"I must have fallen asleep," said he. "I beseech your Highness's +forgiveness; I have slept this long while." It was no business of his if +Wogan chose to attribute his own escape from Newgate as an exploit of +the King's. The story was a familiar one at Bologna, whither they were +hurrying; it was sufficiently known that Charles Wogan was its hero. All +this was Wogan's business, not Gaydon's. Nor had Gaydon anything to do +with any city of dreams or with any lady that might ride into it, or +with any black horse that chanced to carry her. Poets no doubt talked +that way. It was their business. Gaydon was not sorry that he had slept +so heartily through those last stages. He got down from the carriage and +met Wogan coming from the inn with a face of dismay. + +"We are stopped here. There is no help for it. We have gained on the +Prince of Baden, who is no more than two stages ahead. The relays which +carried him from here to the next stage have only this instant come +back. They are too tired to move. So we must stay until they are +refreshed. And we are still three posts this side of Trent!" he cried. +"I would not mind were Trent behind us. But there's no help for it. I +have hired a room where the Countess and her niece can sleep until such +time as we can start." + +Clementina and Mrs. Misset descended and supped in company with Gaydon +and Wogan, while Misset and O'Toole waited upon them as servants. It was +a silent sort of supper, very different from the meal they had made that +morning. For though the fare was better, it lacked the exhilaration. +This delay weighed heavily upon them all. For the country was now for a +sure thing raised behind them, and if they had gained on the Prince of +Baden, their pursuers had no less certainly gained on them. + +"Would we were t'other side of Trent!" exclaimed Wogan; and looking up +he saw that Clementina was watching him with a strange intentness. Her +eyes were on him again while they sat at supper; and when he led her to +the door of her room and she gave him her hand, she stood for a little +while looking deep into his eyes. And though she had much need of sleep, +when she had got into the room and the door was closed behind her, she +remained staring at the logs of the fire. + +For she knew his secret, and to her eyes he was now another man. Before, +Wogan was the untiring servant, the unflinching friend; now he was the +man who loved her. The risks he had run, his journeyings, his unswerving +confidence in the result, his laborious days and nights of preparation, +and the swift execution,--love as well as service claimed a share in +these. He was changed for ever to her eyes; she knew his secret. There +was the cloud no bigger than a man's hand. For she must needs think over +all that he had said and done by the new light the secret shed. When did +he first begin to care? Why? She recalled his first visit long ago to +Ohlau, when he rode across the park on his black horse charged with his +momentous errand. She had been standing, she remembered, before the +blazing log-fire in the great stone hall, much as she was standing now. +Great changes had come since then. She was James Stuart's chosen +wife--and this man loved her. He had no hope of any reward; he desired +even that she should not know. She should no doubt have been properly +sorry and compassionate, but she was a girl simple and frank. To be +loved by a man who could so endure and strive and ask no guerdon,--that +lifted her. She thought the more worthily of herself because he loved +her. She was raised thereby. She could not be sorry; her blood pulsed, +her heart sang, the starry eyes shone with a brighter light. He loved +her. She knew his secret. A little clock chimed the hour upon the +mantel-shelf, and lifting her eyes she saw that just twenty-four hours +had passed since she had driven out of Innspruck up the Brenner. + +As she got into bed a horse galloped up to the inn and stopped. She +remembered that she had not ridden on his black horse out of the sunrise +across the plain. He loved her, and since he loved her, surely--She fell +asleep puzzled and wondering why. She was waked up some two hours +afterwards by a rapping on the door, and she grew hot and she recognised +Wogan's voice cautiously whispering to her to rise with all speed. For +in her dreams from which she had wakened, she had ridden across the flat +green plain into the round city of dreams. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +When the horse galloped up to the door, the Princess turned on her side +and went to sleep. In the common-room below Gaydon and Wogan were +smoking a pipe of tobacco over the fire. Both men rose on the instant; +Wogan stealthily opened the door an inch or so and looked down the +passage. Gaydon raised a corner of the blind and peered through the +window. The two remaining members of the party, Misset and O'Toole, who +as lackeys had served the supper of the Princess, were now eating their +own. When the Princess turned over on her side, and Wogan stepped on +tiptoe to the door and Gaydon peeped through the window, Misset laid +down his knife and fork, and drawing a flask from his pocket emptied its +contents into an earthenware water-jug which stood upon the table. +O'Toole, for his part, simply continued to eat. + +"He is getting off his horse," said Gaydon. + +"Has he ridden hard, do you think?" asked Misset. + +"He looks in a mighty ill-humour." + +O'Toole looked up from his plate, and became gradually aware that +something was occurring. Before he could speak, however, Gaydon dropped +the blind. + +"He is coming in. It will never do for him to find the four of us +together. He may not be the courier from Innspruck; on the other hand, +he may, and seeing the four of us he will ask questions of the landlord. +Seeing no more than two, he will very likely ask none." + +O'Toole began to understand. He understood, at all events, that for him +there was to be no more supper. If two were to make themselves scarce, +he knew that he would be one of the two. + +"Very well," said he, heaving a sigh which made the glasses on the table +dance, and laying his napkin down he got up. To his surprise, however, +he was bidden to stay. + +"Gaydon and I will go," said Wogan. "Jack will find out the fellow's +business." + +Misset nodded his head, took up his knife and fork again. He leaned +across the table to O'Toole as the others stepped out of the room. + +"You speak only French, Lucius. You come from Savoy." He had no time to +say more, for the new-comer stamped blustering down the passage and +flung into the room. The man, as Gaydon had remarked, was in a mighty +ill-humour; his clothes and his face were splashed with mud, and he +seemed, moreover, in the last stage of exhaustion. For though he bawled +for the landlord it was in a weak, hoarse voice, which did not reach +beyond the door. + +Misset looked at him with sympathy. + +"You have no doubt come far," said he; "and the landlord's a laggard. +Here's something that may comfort you till he comes;" and he filled a +glass half full with red Tyrol wine from the bottle at his elbow. + +The man thanked him and advanced to the table. + +"It is a raw hot wine," continued Misset, "and goes better with water;" +and he filled up the glass from the water-jug. The courier reached out +his hand for it. + +"I am the thirstiest man in all Germany," said he, and he took a gulp of +the wine and immediately fell to spluttering. + +"Save us," said he, "but this wine is devilishly strong." + +"Try some more water," said Misset, and again he filled up the glass. +The courier drank it all in a single draught, and stood winking his eyes +and shaking his head. + +"That warms a man," said he. "It does one good;" and again he called for +the landlord, and this time in a strange voice. The landlord still +lagged, however, and Misset did not doubt that Wogan had found a means +to detain him. He filled up the courier's glass again, half wine, half +water. The courier sat heavily down in a chair. + +"I take the liberty, gentlemen," said he. "I am no better than a +dung-heap to sit beside gentlemen. But indeed I can stand no longer. +Never have I stridden across such vile slaughter-house cattle as they +keep for travellers on the Brenner road. I have sprained my legs with +spurring 'em. Seven times," he cried with an oath,--"seven times has a +horse dropped under me to-day. There's not an inch of me unbruised, +curse me if there is! I'm a cake of mud." + +Misset knew very well why the courier had suffered these falls. The +horses he had ridden had first been tired by the Prince of Baden, and +then had the last spark of fire flogged out of them by the Princess's +postillions. He merely shrugged his shoulders, however, and said, "That +looks ill for us." + +The courier gazed suddenly at Misset, then at O'Toole, with a dull sort +of suspicion in his eyes. + +"And which way might you gentlemen be travelling?" + +"To Innspruck; we're from Trent," said Misset, boldly. + +The courier turned to O'Toole. + +"And you too, sir?" + +O'Toole turned a stolid, uncomprehending face upon the courier. + +"Pour moi, monsieur, je suis Savoyard. Monsieur qui vous parle, c'est +mon compagnon de negoce." + +The courier gazed with blank, heavy eyes at O'Toole. He had the +appearance of a man fuddled with drink. He heaved a sigh or two. + +"Will you repeat that," he said at length, "and slowly?" + +O'Toole repeated his remark, and the courier nodded at him. "That's +very strange," said he, solemnly, wagging his head. "I do not dispute +its truth, but it is most strange. I will tell my wife of it." He turned +in his chair, and a twinge from his bruises made him cry out. "I shall +be as stiff as a mummy in the morning," he exclaimed, and swore loudly +at "the bandits" who had caused him this deplorable journey. Misset and +O'Toole exchanged a quick glance, and Misset pushed the glass across the +table. The courier took it, and his eyes lighted up. + +"You have come from Trent," said he. "Did you pass a travelling carriage +on the road?" + +"Yes," said Misset; "the Prince of Baden with a large following drove +into Trent as we came out." + +"Yes, yes," said the courier. "But no second party behind the Prince?" + +Misset shook his head; he made a pretence of consulting O'Toole in +French, and O'Toole shook his head. + +"Then I shall have the robbers," cried the courier. "They are to be +flayed alive, and they deserve it," he shouted fiercely to Misset. +"Gallows-birds!" + +He dropped his head upon his arms and muttered "gallows-birds" again. It +seemed that he was falling asleep, but he suddenly sat up and beat on +the table with his fist. + +"I have eaten nothing since the morning. Ah--gallows-birds--flayed +alive, and hanged--no, hanged and flayed alive--no, that's impossible." +He drank off the wine which Misset had poured out for him, and rose from +his chair. "Where's the landlord? I want supper. I want besides to speak +to him;" and he staggered towards the door. + +"As for supper," said Misset, "we shall be glad if you will share ours. +Travellers should be friendly." + +O'Toole caught the courier by the arm and with a polite speech in French +drew him again down into his chair. The courier stared at O'Toole and +forgot all about the landlord. He had eaten nothing all day, and the +wine and the water-jug had gone to his head. He put a long forefinger on +O'Toole's knee. + +"Say that again," said he, and O'Toole obeyed. A slow, fat smile spread +all over the courier's face. + +"I'll tell my wife about it," said he. He tried to clap O'Toole on the +back, and missing him fell forward with his face on the table. The next +minute he was snoring. Misset walked round the table and deftly picked +his pockets. There was a package in one of them superscribed to "Prince +Taxis, the Governor of Trent." Misset deliberately broke the seal and +read the contents. He handed the package to O'Toole, who read it, and +then flinging it upon the ground danced upon it. Misset went out of the +room and found Wogan and Gaydon keeping watch by Clementina's door. To +them he spoke in a whisper. + +"The fellow brings letters from General Heister to the Governor of Trent +to stop us at all costs. But his letters are destroyed, and he's lying +dead-drunk on the table." + +The three men quickly concerted a plan. The Princess must be roused; a +start must be made at once; and O'Toole must be left behind to keep a +watch upon the courier, Wogan rapped at the door and waked Clementina; +he sent Gaydon to the stables to bribe the ostlers, and with Misset went +down to inform O'Toole. + +O'Toole, however, was sitting with his eyes closed and his head nodding, +surrounded by scraps of the letter which he had danced to pieces. Wogan +shook him by the shoulder, and he opened his eyes and smiled fatuously. + +"He means to tell his wife," he said with a foolish gurgle of laughter. +"He must be an ass. I don't think if I had a wife I should tell her. +Would you, Wogan, tell your wife if you had one? Misset wouldn't tell +his wife." + +Misset interrupted him. + +"What have you drank since I went out of the room?" he asked roughly. He +took up the water-jug and turned it topsy-turvy. It was quite empty. + +"Only water," said O'Toole, dreamily, and he laughed again. "Now I +wouldn't mind telling my wife that," said he. + +Misset let him go and turned with a gesture of despair to Wogan. + +"I poured my flask out into the water-bottle. It was full of burnt +Strasbourg brandy, of double strength. It is as potent as opium. Neither +of them will have his wits before to-morrow. It will not help us to +leave O'Toole to guard the courier." + +"And we cannot take him," said Wogan. "There is the Princess to be +thought of. We must leave him, and we cannot leave him alone, for his +neck's in danger,--more than in danger if the courier wakes before him." + +He picked up carefully the scraps of the letter and placed them in the +middle of the fire. They were hardly burnt before Gaydon came into the +room with word that horses were already being harnessed to the berlin. +Wogan explained their predicament. + +"We must choose which of us three shall stay behind," said he. + +"Which of us two," Misset corrected, pointing to Gaydon and himself. +"When the Princess drives into Bologna, Charles Wogan, who first had the +high heart to dare this exploit, the brain to plot, the hand to execute +it,--Charles Wogan must ride at her side, not Misset, not Gaydon. I take +no man's honours." He shook Wogan by the hand as he spoke, and he had +spoken with an extraordinary warmth of admiration. Gaydon could do no +less than follow his companion's example, though there was a shade of +embarrassment in his manner of assenting. It was not that he had any +envy of Wogan, or any desire to rob him of a single tittle of his due +credit. There was nothing mean in Gaydon's nature, but here was a +halving of Clementina's protectors, and he could not stifle a suspicion +that the best man of the four to leave behind was really Charles Wogan +himself. Not a word, however, of this could he say, and so he nodded his +assent to Misset's proposal. + +"It is I, then, who stay behind with O'Toole and the courier," he said. +"Misset has a wife; the lot evidently falls to me. We will make a shift +somehow or another to keep the fellow quiet till sundown to-morrow, +which time should see you out of danger." He unbuckled the sword from +his waist and laid it on the table, and that simple action somehow +touched Wogan to the heart. He slipped his arm into Gaydon's and said +remorsefully,-- + +"Dick, I do hate to leave you, you and Lucius. I swept you into the +peril, you two, my friends, and now I leave you in the thick of it to +find a way out for yourselves. But there is no remedy, is there? I shall +not rest until I see you both again. Goodbye, Lucius." He looked at +O'Toole sprawling with outstretched legs upon his groaning chair. "My +six feet four," said he, turning to Gaydon; "you must give me the +passport. Have a good care of him, Dick;" and he gripped O'Toole +affectionately by the arms for a second, and then taking the passport +hurried from the room. Gaydon had seldom seen Wogan so moved. + +The berlin was brought round to the door; the Princess, rosy with sleep, +stepped into it; Wogan had brought with him a muff, and he slipped it +over Clementina's feet to keep her warm during the night; Misset took +Gaydon's place, and the postillion cracked his whip and set off towards +Trent. Gaydon, sitting before the fire in the parlour, heard the wheels +grate upon the road; he had a vision of the berlin thundering through +the night with a trail of sparks from the wheels; and he wondered +whether Misset was asleep or merely leaning back with his eyes shut, and +thus visiting incognito Woman's fairy-land of dreams. However, Gaydon +consoled himself with the reflection that it was none of his business. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +But Gaydon was out of his reckoning. There were no fairy tales told for +Misset to overhear, and the Princess Clementina slept in her corner of +the carriage. If a jolt upon a stone wakened her, a movement opposite +told her that her sentinel was watchful and alert. Three times the +berlin stopped for a change of horses; and on each occasion Wogan was +out of the door and hurrying the ostlers before the wheels had ceased to +revolve. + +"You should sleep, my friend," said she. + +"Not till we reach Italy," he replied; and with the confidence of a +child she nestled warmly in her cloak again and closed her eyes. This +feeling of security was a new luxury to her after the months of anxiety +and prison. The grey light of the morning stole into the berlin and +revealed to her the erect and tireless figure of her saviour. The sun +leaped down the mountain-peaks, and the grey of the light was now a +sparkling gold. Wogan bade her Highness look from the carriage window, +and she could not restrain a cry of delight. On her left, mountain-ridge +rose behind mountain-ridge, away to the towering limestone cliffs of +Monte Scanupia; on her right, the white peaks of the Orto d'Abram +flashed to the sun; and between the hills the broad valley of the Adige +rolled southwards,--a summer country of villages and vines, of +mulberry-trees and fields of maize, in the midst of which rose the +belfries of an Italian town. + +"This is Italy," she cried. + +"But the Emperor's Italy," answered Wogan; and at half-past nine that +morning the carriage stopped in the public square of Trent. As Wogan +stepped onto the ground, he saw a cloud of dust at the opposite side of +the square, and wrapped in that cloud men on horseback like soldiers in +the smoke of battle; he heard, too, the sound of wheels. The Prince of +Baden had that instant driven away, and he had taken every procurable +horse in the town. Wogan's own horses could go no further. He came back +to the door of the carriage. + +"I must search through Trent," said he, "on the mere chance of finding +what will serve us. Your Highness must wait in the inn;" and Clementina, +muffling her face, said to him,-- + +"I dare not. My face is known in Trent, though this is the first time +ever I saw it. But many gentlemen from Trent came to the Innspruck +carnival, and of these a good number were kind enough to offer me their +hearts. They were allowed to besiege me to their content. I must needs +remain in the shelter of the carriage." + +Wogan left Misset to stand sentinel, and hurried off upon his business. +He ran from stable to stable, from inn to inn. The Prince of Baden had +hired thirty-six horses; six more were nowhere to be found. Wogan would +be content with four; he ended in a prayer for two. At each house the +door was shut in his face. Wogan was in despair; nowhere could delay be +so dangerous as at Trent, where there were soldiers, and a Governor who +would not hesitate to act without orders if he suspected the Princess +Clementina was escaping through his town. Two hours had passed in +Wogan's vain search,--two hours of daylight, during which Clementina had +sat in an unharnessed carriage in the market square. Wogan ran back to +the square, half expecting to find that she had been recognised and +arrested. As he reached the square, he saw that curious people were +loitering about the carriage; as he pushed through them, he heard them +questioning why travellers should on so hot a morning of spring sit +muffled up in a close, dark carriage when they could take their ease +beneath trees in the inn-garden. One man laughed out at the Princess and +the comical figure she made with her scarlet cloak drawn tight about her +face. Wogan himself had bought that cloak in Strasbourg to guard his +Princess from the cold of the Brenner, and guessed what discomfort its +ermine lining must now be costing her. And this lout dared to laugh and +make her, this incomparable woman, a butt for his ridicule! Wogan took a +step towards the fellow with his fists clenched, but thought the better +of his impulse, and turning away ran to the palace of Prince Taxis. + +This desperate course alone remained to him; he must have speech with +the Prince-bishop himself. At the palace, however, he was informed that +the Prince was in bed with the gout. Mr. Wogan, however, insisted. + +"You will present my duties to the Prince; you will show him my +passport; you will say that the Count of Cernes has business of the last +importance in Italy, and begs permission, since the Prince of Baden has +hired every post-horse in the town, to requisition half a dozen +farm-horses from the fields." + +Mr. Wogan kicked his heels in the courtyard while the message was taken. +At any moment some rumour of the curious spectacle in the square might +be brought to the palace and excite inquiry. There might be another +courier in pursuit besides the man whom Gaydon kept a prisoner. Wogan +was devoured with a fever of impatience. It seemed to him hours before +the Prince's secretary returned to him. The secretary handed him back +his passport, and on the part of the Prince made a speech full of +civilities. + +"Here's a great deal of jam, sir," said Wogan. "I misdoubt me but what +there's a most unpalatable pill hidden away in it." + +"Indeed," said the secretary, "the Prince begs you to be content and to +wait for the post-horses to return." + +"Ah, ah!" cried Wogan, "but that's the one thing I cannot do. I must +speak plainly, it appears." He drew the secretary out of ear-shot, and +resumed: "My particular business is to catch up the Prince of Baden. He +is summoned back to Innspruck. Do you understand?" he asked +significantly. + +"Sir, we are well informed in Trent as to the Emperor's wishes," said +the secretary, with a great deal of dignity. + +"No, no, my friend," said Wogan. "It is not by the Emperor the Prince of +Baden is summoned, though I have no doubt the summons is much to his +taste." + +The secretary stepped back in surprise. + +"By her Highness the Princess?" he exclaimed. + +"She changes her mind; she is willing where before she was obdurate. To +tell you the truth, the Prince plied her too hard, and she would have +none of him. Now that he turns his back and puts the miles as fast as he +can between himself and her, she cannot sleep for want of him." + +The secretary nodded his head sagaciously. + +"Her Highness is a woman," said he, "and that explains all. But it will +do her no harm to suffer a little longer for her obstinacy, and, to tell +you the truth, the Prince Taxis is so tormented with the gout that--" + +"That you are unwilling to approach him a second time," interrupted +Wogan. "I have no doubt of it. I have myself seen prelates in a most +unprelatical mood. But here is a case where needs must. I have not told +you all. There is a devil of a fellow called Charles Wogan." + +The secretary nodded his head. + +"A mad Irishman who has vowed to free her Highness." + +"He has set out from Strasbourg with that aim." + +"He will hang for it, then, but he will never rescue her;" and the +secretary began to laugh. "I cannot upon my honour vex the Prince again +because a gallows-bird has prated in his cups." + +"No, no," said Wogan; "you do not follow me. Charles Wogan will come to +the gallows over this adventure. For my part, I would have him broken on +the wheel and tortured in many uncomfortable ways. These Irishmen all +the world over are pestilent fellows. But the trouble is this: If her +Highness hears of his attempt, she is, as you sagely discovered, a +woman, a trivial, trifling thing. She will be absurd enough to imagine +her rescue possible; she will again change her mind, and it is precisely +that which General Heister fears. He would have her formally betrothed +to the Prince of Baden before Charles Wogan is caught and hanged +sky-high. Therefore, since I was pressing into Italy, he charged me with +this message to the Prince of Baden. Now observe this, if you please. +Suppose that I do not overtake the Prince; suppose that her Highness +hears of Wogan's coming and again changes her mind,--who will be to +blame? Not I, for I have done my best, not Prince Taxis, for he is not +informed, but Prince Taxis's secretary." + +The secretary yielded to Wogan's argument. He might be in a great fear +of Prince Taxis, but he was in a greater of the Emperor's wrath. He left +Wogan again, and in a little while came back with the written +permission which Wogan desired. Wogan wasted no time in unnecessary +civilities; the morning had already been wasted. The clocks were +striking one as he hurried away from the palace, and before two the +Princess Clementina was able to throw back her cloak from about her face +and take the air; for the berlin was on the road from Trent to Roveredo. + +"Those were the four worst hours since we left Innspruck," she said. "I +thought I should suffocate." The revulsion from despair, the knowledge +that each beat of the hoofs brought them nearer to safety, the glow of +the sun upon a country which was Italy in all but name, raised them all +to the top of their spirits. Clementina was in her gayest mood; she +lavished caresses upon her "little woman," as she called Mrs. Misset; +she would have Wogan give her an account of his interview with Prince +Taxis's secretary; she laughed with the merriest enjoyment over his +abuse of Charles Wogan. + +"But it was not myself alone whom I slandered," said he. "Your Highness +had a share of our abuse. Our heads wagged gravely over woman's +inconstancies. It was not in nature but you must change your mind. +Indeed, your Highness would have laughed." + +But at all events her Highness did not laugh now. On the contrary, her +eyes lost all their merriment, and her blood rushed hotly into her +cheeks. She became for that afternoon a creature of moods, now talking +quickly and perhaps a trifle wildly, now relapsing into long silences. +Wogan was troubled by a thought that the strain of her journey was +telling its tale even upon her vigorous youth. It may be that she noted +his look of anxiety, but she said to him abruptly and with a sort of +rebellion,-- + +"You would despise any woman who had the temerity to change her mind." + +"Nay; I do not say that." + +"But it is merely politeness that restrains you. You would despise her, +judging her by men. When a man changes his mind, why, it is so, he +changes his mind. But when a girl does, it may well be that for the +first time she is seriously exercising her judgment. For her upbringing +renders it natural that she should allow others to make up her mind for +her at the first." + +"That I think is very true," said Wogan. + +Clementina, however, was not satisfied with his assent. She attacked him +again and almost vindictively. + +"You of course would never change your mind for any reason, once it was +fixed. You are resolute. You are quite, quite perfect." + +Mr. Wogan could not imagine what he had done thus to provoke her irony. + +"Madam," he pleaded, "I am not in truth so obstinate a fellow as you +make me out. I have often changed my mind. I take some pride in it on +occasion." + +Her Highness inclined to a greater graciousness. + +"I am glad to know it. You shall give me examples. One may have a stiff +neck and yet no cause for pride." + +Wogan looked so woe-begone under this reproof that Clementina suddenly +broke out into a laugh, and so showed herself in a fresh and more +familiar mood. The good-humour continued; she sat opposite to Mr. Wogan; +if she moved, her hand, her knee, her foot, must needs touch his; she +made him tell her stories of his campaigns; and so the evening came upon +them,--an evening of stars and mysterious quiet and a clear, dark sky. + +They passed Roveredo; they drew near to Ala, the last village in the +Emperor's territories. Five miles beyond Ala they would be on Venetian +soil, and already they saw the lights of the village twinkling like so +many golden candles. But the berlin, which had drawn them so stoutly +over these rugged mountain-roads, failed them at the last. One of the +hind wheels jolted violently upon a great stone, there was a sudden +cracking of wood, and the carriage lurched over, throwing its occupants +one against the other. + +Wogan disentangled himself, opened the door, and sprang out. He sprang +out into a pool of water. One glance at the carriage, dark though the +night was, told him surely what had happened. The axle-tree was broken. +He saw that Clementina was about to follow him. + +"There is water," said he. "It is ankle-deep." + +"And no white stone," she answered with a laugh, "whereon I can safely +set my foot?" + +"No," said he, "but you can trust without fear to my arms;" and he +reached them out to her. + +"Can I?" said she, in a curious voice; and when he had lifted her from +the carriage, she was aware that she could not. He lifted her daintily, +like a piece of porcelain; but to lift her was not enough, he must carry +her. His arms tightened about her waist, hers in spite of herself about +his shoulders. He took a step or two from the carriage, with the water +washing over his boots, and the respectful support of a servant became +the warm grip of a man. He no longer held her daintily; he clipped her +close to him, straining her breasts against his chest; he was on fire +with her. She could not but know it; his arms shook, his bosom heaved; +she felt the quick hammering of his heart; and a murmur, an inarticulate +murmur, of infinite longing trembled from his throat. And something of +his madness passed into her and made a sweet tumult in her blood. He +stopped still holding her; he felt her fingers clasp tighter; he looked +downwards into her face upturned to his. They were alone for a moment, +these two, alone in an uninhabited world. The broken carriage, the busy +fingers about it, the smoking horses, the lights of Ala twinkling in the +valley, had not even the substance of shadows. They simply were not, and +they never had been. There were just two people alive between the +Poles,--not princess and servant, but man and woman in the primitive +relationship of rescuer and rescued; and they stood in the dark of a +translucent night of spring, with the stars throbbing above them to the +time of their passionate hearts, and the earth stretching about them +rich as black velvet. He looked down into her eyes as once in the +night-time he had done before; and again he marvelled at their +steadiness and their mysterious depths. Her eyes were fixed on his and +did not flinch; her arms were close about his neck; he bent his head +towards her, and she said in a queer, toneless voice, low but as steady +as her eyes,-- + +"I know. Ah, but well I know. Last night I dreamed; I rode on your black +horse into your city of dreams;" and the moment of passion ended in +farce. For Wogan, startled by the words, set her down there and then +into the pool. She stood over her ankles in water. She uttered a little +cry and shivered. Then she laughed and sprang lightly onto dry soil, +making much of her companion's awkwardness. Wogan joined in the +laughter, finding therein as she did a cover and a cloak. + +"We must walk to Ala," said he. + +"It is as well," said she. "There was a time when cavaliers laid their +cloaks in the mud to save a lady's shoe-sole." + +"Madam," said Wogan, "the chivalry of to-day has the same intention." + +"But in its effect," said she, "it is more rheumatical." + +Wogan searched in the carriage and drew out a coil of rope which he +slung across his shoulders like a bandolier. Clementina laughed at him +for his precautions, but Wogan was very serious. "I would not part with +it," said he. "I never travelled for four days without being put to it +for a piece of rope." + +They left the postillion to make what he could of the berlin and walked +forward in the clear night to Ala. The shock of the tumble had alarmed +Mrs. Misset; the fatigue of the journey had strained her endurance to +the utmost. She made no complaint, but she could walk but slowly and +with many rests by the way. It took a long while for them to reach the +village. They saw the lights diminish in the houses; the stars grew +pale; there came a hint of morning in the air. The laughter at Wogan's +awkwardness had long since died away, and they walked in silence. + +Forty-eight hours had passed since the berlin left Innspruck. +Twenty-four hours ago Clementina knew Wogan's secret. Now he was aware +that she knew it. They could not look into each other's faces, but their +eyes conversed of it. If they turned their heads sharply away, that +aversion of their gaze spoke no less clearly. There was a link between +them now, and a secret link, the sweeter on that account, +perhaps,--certainly the more dangerous. The cloud had grown much bigger +than a man's hand. Moreover, she had never seen James Stuart; she had +his picture, it is true, but the picture could not recall. It must +create, not revivify his image to her thoughts, and that it could not +do; so that he remained a shadowy figure to her, a mere number of +features, almost an abstraction. On the other hand the King's emissary +walked by her side, sat sleepless before her, had held her in his arms, +had talked with her, had risked his life for her; she knew him. What she +knew of James Stuart, she knew chiefly from the lips of this emissary. +On this walk to Ala he spoke of his master, and remorsefully in the +highest praise. But she knew his secret, she knew that he loved her, and +therefore every remorseful, loyal word he spoke praised him more than it +praised his master. And it happened that just as they came to the +outskirts of the village, she dropped a handkerchief which hung loosely +about her neck. For a moment she did not remark her loss; when she did +and turned, she saw that her companion was rising from the ground on +which no handkerchief longer lay, and that he had his right hand in his +breast. She turned again without a word, and walked forward. But she +knew that kerchief was against his heart, and the cloud still grew. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +They reached Ala towards two o'clock of the morning. The town had some +reputation in those days for its velvets and silks, and Wogan made no +doubt that somewhere he would procure a carriage to convey them the +necessary five miles into Venetian territory. The Prince of Baden was +still ahead of them, however. The inn of "The Golden Lion" had not a +single horse fit for their use in its stables. Wogan, however, obtained +there a few likely addresses and set out alone upon his search. He +returned in a couple of hours with a little two-wheeled cart drawn by a +pony, and sent word within that he was ready. Clementina herself with +her hood thrown back from her face came out to him at the door. An oil +lamp swung in the passage and lit up her face. Wogan could see that the +face was grave and anxious. + +"Your Highness and Mrs. Misset can ride in the cart. It has no springs, +to be sure, and may shake to pieces like plaster. But if it carries you +five miles, it will serve. Misset and I can run by the side." + +"But Lucy Misset must not go," said Clementina. "She is ill, and no +wonder. She must not take one step more to-night. There would be great +danger, and indeed she has endured enough for me." The gravity of the +girl's face, as much as her words, convinced Wogan that here was no +occasion for encouragement or resistance. He said with some +embarrassment,-- + +"Yet we cannot leave her here alone; and of us two men, her husband must +stay with her." + +"Dare we wait till the morning?" asked Clementina. "Lucy may be +recovered then." + +Wogan shook his head. + +"The courier we stopped at Wellishmile was not the only man sent after +us. Of that we may be very sure. Here are we five miles from safety, and +while those five miles are still unbridged--Listen!" + +Wogan leaned his head forward and held up his hand for silence. In the +still night they could hear far away the galloping of a horse. The sound +grew more distinct as they listened. + +"The rider comes from Italy," said Clementina. "But he might have come +from Trent," cried Wogan. "We left Trent behind twelve hours ago, and +more. For twelve hours we crept and crawled along the road; these last +miles we have walked. Any moment the Emperor's troopers might come +riding after us. Ah, but we are not safe! I am afraid!" + +Clementina turned sharply towards him as he spoke this unwonted +confession. + +"You!" she exclaimed with a wondering laugh. Yet he had spoken the +truth. His face was twitching; his eyes had the look of a man scared out +of his wits. + +"Yes, I am afraid," he said in a low, uneasy voice. "When I have all but +won through the danger, then comes my moment of fear. In the thick of +it, perils tread too close upon the heels of peril for a man to count +them up. Each minute claims your hands and eyes and brain,--claims you +and inspires you. But when the danger's less, and though less still +threatens; when you're just this side of safety's frontier and not +safe,--indeed, indeed, one should be afraid. A vain spirit of +confidence, and the tired head nods, and the blow falls on it from +nowhere. Oh, but I have seen examples times out of mind. I beg you, no +delay!" + +The hoofs of the approaching horse sounded ever louder while Wogan +spoke; and as he ended, a man rode out from the street into the open +space before the inn. The gallop became a trot. + +"He is riding to the door," said Wogan. "The light falls on your face;" +and he drew Clementina into the shadow of the wall. But at the same +moment the rider changed his mind. He swerved; it seemed too that he +used his spurs, for his horse bounded beneath him and galloped past the +inn. He disappeared into the darkness, and the sound of the horse +diminished. Wogan listened until they had died away. + +"He rides into Austria!" said he. "He rides to Trent, to Brixen, to +Innspruck! And in haste. Let us go! I had even a fancy that I knew his +voice." + +"From a single oath uttered in anger! Nay, you are all fears. For my +part, I was afraid that he had it in his mind to stay here at this inn +where my little woman lies. What if suspicion fall on her? What if those +troopers of the Emperor find her and guess the part she played!" + +"You make her safe by seeking safety," returned Wogan. "You are the prey +the Emperor flies at. Once you are out of reach, his mere dignity must +hold him in from wreaking vengeance on your friends." + +Wogan went into the inn, and calling Misset told him of his purpose. He +would drive her Highness to Peri, a little village ten miles from Ala, +but in Italy. At Peri, Mrs. Misset and her husband were to rejoin them +in the morning, and from Peri they could travel by slow stages to +Bologna. The tears flowed from Clementina's eyes when she took her +farewell of her little woman. Though her reason bowed to Wogan's +argument, she had a sense of cowardice in deserting so faithful a +friend. Mrs. Misset, however, joined in Wogan's prayer; and she mounted +into the trap and at Wogan's side drove out of the town by that street +along which the horseman had ridden. + +Clementina was silent; her driver was no more talkative. They were alone +and together on the road to Italy. That embarrassment from which Wogan's +confession of fear had procured them some respite held them in a stiff +constraint. They were conscious of it as of a tide engulfing them. +Neither dared to speak, dreading what might come of speech. The most +careless question, the most indifferent comment, might, as it seemed to +both, be the spark to fire a mine. Neither had any confidence to say, +once they had begun to talk, whither the talk would lead; but they were +very much afraid, and they sat very still lest a movement of the one +should provoke a question in the other. She knew his secret, and he was +aware that she knew it. She could not have found it even then in her +heart to part willingly with her knowledge. She had thought over-much +upon it during the last day. She had withdrawn herself into it from the +company of her fellow-travellers, as into a private chamber; it was +familiar and near. Nor would Wogan have desired, now that she had the +knowledge, to deprive her of it, but he knew it instinctively for a +dangerous thing. He drove on in silence while the stars paled in the +heavens and a grey, pure light crept mistily up from the under edges of +the world, and the morning broke hard and empty and cheerless. Wogan +suddenly drew in the reins and stopped the cart. + +"There is a high wall behind us. It stretches across the fields from +either side," said he. "It makes a gateway of the road." + +Clementina turned. The wall was perhaps ten yards behind them. + +"A gateway," said she, "through which we have passed." + +"The gateway of Italy," answered Wogan; and he drew the lash once or +twice across the pony's back and so was silent. Clementina looked at his +set and cheerless face, cheerless as that chill morning, and she too was +silent. She looked back along the road which she had traversed through +snow and sunshine and clear nights of stars; she saw it winding out from +the gates of Innspruck over the mountains, above the foaming river, and +after a while she said very wistfully,-- + +"There are worse lives than a gipsy's." + +"Are there any better?" answered Wogan. + +So this was what Mr. Wogan's fine project had come to. He remembered +another morning when the light had welled over the hills, sunless and +clear and cold, on the road to Bologna,--the morning of the day when he +had first conceived the rescue of Clementina. And the rescue had been +effected, and here was Clementina safe out of Austria, and Wogan sure of +a deathless renown, of the accomplishment of an endeavour held absurd +and preposterous; and these two short sentences were their summary and +comment,-- + +"There are worse lives than a gipsy's." + +"Are there any better?" + +Both had at this supreme crisis of their fortunes but the one +thought,--that the only days through which they had really lived were +those last two days of flight, of hurry, of hope alternating with +despair, of light-hearted companionship, days never to be forgotten, +when each snatched meal was a picnic seasoned with laughter, days of +unharnessed freedom lived in the open air. + +Clementina was the first to perceive that her behaviour fell below the +occasion. She was safe in Italy, journeying henceforward safely to her +betrothed. She spurred herself to understand it, she forced her lips to +sing aloud the Te Deum. Wogan looked at her in surprise as the first +notes were sung, and the woful appeal in her eyes compelled him to as +brave a show as he could make of joining in the hymn. But the words +faltered, the tune wavered, joyless and hollow in that empty morning. + +"Drive on," said Clementina, suddenly; and she had a sense that she was +being driven into bondage,--she who had just been freed. Wogan drove on +towards Peri. + +It was the morning of Sunday, the 30th of April; and as the little cart +drew near to this hamlet of thirty cottages, the travellers could hear +the single bell in the church belfry calling the villagers to Mass. +Wogan spoke but once to Clementina, and then only to point out a wooden +hut which stood picturesquely on a wooded bluff of Monte Lessini, high +up upon the left. A narrow gorge down which a torrent foamed led upwards +to the bluff, and the hut of which the windows were shuttered, and which +seemed at that distance to have been built with an unusual elegance, was +to Wogan's thinking a hunting-box. Clementina looked up at the bluff +indifferently and made no answer. She only spoke as Wogan drove past +the church-door, and the sound of the priest's voice came droning out to +them. + +"Will you wait for me?" she asked. "I will not be long." + +Wogan stopped the pony. + +"You would give thanks?" said he. "I understand." + +"I would pray for an honest heart wherewith to give honest thanks," said +Clementina, in a low voice; and she added hastily, "There is a life of +ceremonies, there is a life of cities before me. I have lived under the +skies these last two days." + +She went into the church, shrouding her face in her hood, and kneeled +down before a rush chair close to the door. A sense of gratitude, +however, was not that morning to be got by any prayers, however earnest. +It was merely a distaste for ceremonies and observances, she strenuously +assured herself, that had grown upon her during these ten days. She +sought to get rid of that distaste, as she kneeled, by picturing in her +thoughts the Prince to whom she was betrothed. She recalled the +exploits, the virtues, which Wogan had ascribed to him; she stamped them +upon the picture. "It is the King," she said to herself; and the picture +answered her, "It is the King's servant." And, lo! the face of the +picture was the face of Charles Wogan. She covered her cheeks with her +hands in a burning rush of shame; she struck in her thoughts at the face +of that image with her clenched fists, to bruise, to annihilate it. "It +is the King! It is the King! It is the King!" she cried in her remorse, +but the image persisted. It still wore the likeness of Charles Wogan; it +still repeated, "No, it is the King's servant." There was more of the +primitive woman in this girl bred in the rugged country-side of Silesia +than even Wogan was aware of, and during the halts in their journey she +had learned from Mrs. Misset details which Wogan had been at pains to +conceal. It was Wogan who had conceived the idea of her rescue--in the +King's place. In the King's place, Wogan had come to Innspruck and +effected it. In the King's place, he had taken her by the hand and cleft +a way for her through her enemies. He was the man, the rescuer; she was +the woman, the rescued. + +She became conscious of the futility of her attitude of prayer. She +raised her head and saw that a man kneeling close to the altar had +turned and was staring fixedly towards her. The man was the Prince of +Baden. Had he recognised her? She peered between her fingers; she +remarked that his gaze was puzzled; he was not then sure, though he +suspected. She waited until he turned his head again, and then she +silently rose to her feet and slipped out of the church. She found Wogan +waiting for her in some anxiety. + +"Did he recognise you?" he asked. + +"He was not sure," answered Clementina. "How did you know he was at +Mass?" + +"A native I spoke with told me." + +Clementina climbed up into the cart. + +"The Prince is not a generous man," she said hesitatingly. + +Wogan understood her. The Prince of Baden must not know that she had +come to Peri escorted by a single cavalier. He would talk bitterly, he +would make much of his good fortune in that he had not married the +Princess Clementina, he would pity the Chevalier de St. George,--there +was a fine tale there. Wogan could trace it across the tea-tables of +Europe, and hear the malicious inextinguishable laughter which winged it +on its way. He drove off quickly from the church door. + +"He leaves Peri at nine," said Wogan. "He will have no time to make +inquiries. We have but to avoid the inn he stays at. There is a second +at the head of the village which we passed." + +To this second inn Wogan drove, and was welcomed by a shrewish woman +whose sour face was warmed for once in a way into something like +enthusiasm. + +"A lodging indeed you shall have," cried she, "and a better lodging than +the Prince of Baden can look back upon, though he pay never so dearly +for it. Poor man, he will have slept wakefully this night! Here, sir, +you will find honest board and an honest bed for yourself and your sweet +lady, and an honest bill to set you off in a sweet humour in the +morning." + +"Nay, my good woman," interrupted Wogan, hastily. "This is no sweet lady +of mine, nor are we like to stay until the morrow. The truth is, we are +a party of four, but our carriage snapped its axle some miles back. The +young lady's uncle and aunt are following us, and we wait only for their +arrival." + +Wogan examined the inn and thought the disposition of it very +convenient. It made three sides of a courtyard open to the road. On the +right and the bottom were farm-buildings and a stable; the inn was the +wing upon the left hand. The guest rooms, of which there were four, were +all situated upon the first floor and looked out upon a little thicket +of fir-trees at the back of the wing. They were approached by a +staircase, which ran up with a couple of turns from the courtyard itself +and on the outside of the house-wall. Wogan was very pleased with that +staircase; it was narrow. He was pleased, too, because there were no +other travellers in the inn. He went back to the landlady. + +"It is very likely," said he, "that my friends when they come will, +after all, choose to stay here for the night. I will hire all the rooms +upon the first floor." + +The landlady was no less pleased than Mr. Wogan. She had a thought that +they were a runaway couple and served them breakfast in a little parlour +up the stairs with many sly and confusing allusions. She became +confused, however, when after breakfast Clementina withdrew to bed, and +Wogan sauntered out into the high-road, where he sat himself down on a +bank to watch for Captain Misset. All day he sat resolutely with his +back towards the inn. The landlady inferred that here were lovers +quarrelling, and she was yet more convinced of it when she entered the +parlour in the afternoon to lay the table for dinner and saw Clementina +standing wistfully at the window with her eyes upon that unmoving back. +Wogan meanwhile for all his vigilance watched the road but ill. +Merchants, pedlars, friars, and gentlemen travelling for their pleasure +passed down the road into Italy. Mr. Wogan saw them not, or saw them +with unseeing eyes. His eyes were turned inwards, and he gazed at a +picture that his heart held of a room in that inn behind him, where +after all her dangers and fatigues a woman slept in peace. Towards +evening fewer travellers passed by, but there came one party of six +well-mounted men whose leader suddenly bowed his head down upon his +horse's neck as he rode past. Wogan had preached a sermon on the +carelessness which comes with danger's diminutions, but he was very +tired. The head was nodding; the blow might fall from nowhere, and he +not know. + +At nightfall he returned and mounted to the parlour, where Clementina +awaited him. + +"There is no sign of Captain Misset," said he. + +Wogan was puzzled by the way in which Clementina received the news. For +a moment he thought that her eyes lightened, and that she was glad; then +it seemed to him that her eyes clouded and suddenly as if with pain. Nor +was her voice a guide to him, for she spoke her simple question without +significance,-- + +"Must we wait, then, till the morning?" + +"There is a chance that they may come before the morning. I will watch +on the top stair, and if they come I will make bold to wake your +Highness." + +Their hostess upon this brought their supper into the room, and Wogan +became at once aware of a change in her demeanour. She no longer +embarrassed them with her patronage, nor did she continue her sly +allusions to the escapades of lovers. On the contrary, she was of an +extreme deference. Under the deference, too, Wogan seemed to remark a +certain excitement. + +"Have you other lodgers to-night?" he asked carelessly. + +"No, sir," said she. "Travellers are taken by a big house and a bustle +of servants. They stay at the Vapore Inn when they stay at Peri, and to +their cost." + +As soon as she had left the room Wogan asked of Clementina,-- + +"When did her manner change?" + +"I had not remarked the change till now," replied Clementina. + +Wogan became uneasy. He went down into the courtyard, and found it +empty. There was a light in the kitchen, and he entered the room. The +landlady was having her supper in company with her few servants, and +there were one or two peasants from the village. Wogan chatted with them +for a few minutes and came out again much relieved of his fears. He +thought, however, it might be as well to see that his pony was ready for +an emergency. He crossed silently to the stable, which he found dark as +the courtyard. The door was latched, but not locked. He opened it and +went in. The building was long, with many stalls ranged side by side. +Wogan's pony stood in the end stall opposite to the door. Wogan took +down the harness from the pegs and began to fix it ready on the pony. He +had just put the collar over its head when he heard a horse stamping in +one of the stalls at the other end of the stables. Now he had noticed in +the morning that there were only two horses in the building, and those +two were tied up in the stalls next to that which his pony occupied. He +walked along the range of stalls. The two horses were there, then came a +gap of empty stalls, and beyond the gap he counted six other horses. +Wogan became at once curious about those six other horses. They might of +course be farm-horses, but he wished to know. It was quite dark within +the building; he had only counted the horses by the noise of their +movements in their stalls, the rattle of their head-ropes, and the +pawing of their feet. He dared not light a lamp, but horses as a rule +knew him for a friend. He went into the stall of the first, petted it +for a moment and ran his hand down its legs. He repeated the process +with the second, and with so much investigation he was content. No +farm-horse that ever Wogan had seen had such a smooth sleek skin or +such fine legs as had those two over which he had passed his hands. "Now +where are the masters of those horses?" he asked himself. "Why do they +leave their cattle at this inn and not show themselves in the kitchen or +the courtyard? Why do they not ask for a couple of my rooms?" Wogan +stood in the dark and reflected. Then he stepped out of the door with +even more caution than he had used when entering by it. He stole +silently along to the shed where his trap was housed, and felt beneath +the seat. From beneath the seat he drew out a coil of rope, and a lamp. +The rope he wound about him under his coat. Then he went back to his +staircase and the parlour. + +Clementina could read in his face that something was amiss, but she had +a great gift of silence. She waited for him to speak. Wogan unwound the +coil of rope from his body. + +"Your Highness laughed at me for that I would not part with my rope. I +have a fear this night will prove my wisdom." And with that he began +deliberately to break up the chairs in the room. Clementina asked no +questions; she watched him take the rungs and bars of the chairs and +test their strength. Then he cut the coil of rope in half and tied loops +at intervals; into the loops he fitted the wooden rungs. Wogan worked +expeditiously for an hour without opening his mouth. In an hour he had +fashioned a rope-ladder. He went to the window which looked out on the +back of the wing, upon the little thicket of fir-trees. He opened the +window cautiously and dropped the ladder down the wall. + +"Your Highness has courage," said he. "The ladder does not touch the +ground, but it will not be far to drop, should there be need." + +The window of Clementina's bedroom was next to that of the parlour and +looked out in the same direction. Wogan fixed the rope-ladder securely +to the foot of the bed and drew the bed close to the window. He left the +lamp upon a chair and went back to the parlour and explained. + +"Your Highness," he added, "there may be no cause for any alarm. On the +other hand, the Governor of Trent may have taken a leaf from my own +book. He may have it in mind to snatch your Highness out of Italy even +as I did out of Austria; and of a truth it would be the easier +undertaking. Here are we five miles from the border and in a small +tavern set apart from a small village, instead of in the thick of an +armed town." + +"But we might start now," she said. "We might leave a message behind for +Mrs. Misset and wait for her in Verona." + +"I had thought of that. But if my mere suspicion is the truth, the six +men will not be so far from their six horses that we could drive away +unnoticed by any one of them. Nor could we hope to outpace them and six +men upon an open road; indeed, I would sooner face them at the head of +my staircase here. And while I hold them back your Highness can creep +down that ladder." + +"And hide in the thicket," she interrupted. "Yet--yet--that leaves you +alone. I could give you some help;" and her face coloured. "You were so +kind as to tell me I had courage. I could at the least load your +pistols." + +"You would do that?" cried Wogan. "Aye, but you would, you would!" + +For the first time that day he forgot to address her with the ceremony +of her title. All that day he had schooled his tongue to the use of it. +They were not man and woman, though his heart would have it so; they +were princess and servant, and every minute he must remember it. But he +forgot it now. Delicate she was to look upon as any princess who had +ever adorned a court, delicate and fresh, rich-voiced and young, but +here was the rare woman flashing out like a light over stormy seas, the +spirit of her and her courage! + +"You would load my pistols!" he repeated, his whole face alight. "To be +sure, you would do that. But I ask you, I think, for a higher courage. I +ask you to climb down that ladder, to run alone, taking shelter when +there's need, back to that narrow gorge we saw where the path leads +upwards to the bluff. There was a hut; two hours would take you to it, +and there you should be safe. I will keep the enemy back till you are +gone. If I can, when all is over here I'll follow you. If I do not come, +why, you must--" + +"Ah, but you will come," said she, with a smile. "I have no fears but +that you will come;" and she added, "Else would you never persuade me +to go." + +"Well, then, I will come. At all events, Captain Misset and his wife +will surely come down the road to-morrow. If I rap twice upon your door, +you will take that for my signal. But it is very likely I shall not rap +at all." + +Wogan shivered as he spoke. It was not for the first time during that +conversation, and a little later, as they stood together in the passage +by the stair-head, Clementina twice remarked that he shivered again. +There was an oil lamp burning against the passage wall, and by its light +she could see that on that warm night of spring his face was pinched +with cold. He was in truth chilled to the bone through lack of sleep; +his eyes had the strained look of a man strung to the breaking point, +and at the sight of him the mother in her was touched. + +"What if I watched to-night?" she said. "What if you slept?" + +Wogan laughed the suggestion aside. + +"I shall sleep very well," said he, "upon that top stair. I can count +upon waking, though only the lowest step tremble beneath a foot." This +he said, meaning not to sleep at all, as Clementina very well +understood. She leaned over the balustrade by Wogan's side and looked +upwards to the sky. The night was about them like a perfume of flowers. +A stream bubbled and sang over stones behind the inn. The courtyard +below was very silent. She laid a hand upon his sleeve and said again +in a pleading voice,-- + +"Let me watch to-night. There is no danger. You are racked by +sleeplessness, and phantoms born of it wear the face of truth to you. We +are safe; we are in Italy. The stars tell me so. Let me watch to-night." +And at once she was startled. He withdrew his arm so roughly that it +seemed he flung off his hand; he spoke in a voice so hoarse and rough +she did not know it for his. And indeed it was a different man who now +confronted her,--a man different from the dutiful servant who had +rescued her, different even from the man who had held her so tenderly in +his arms on the road to Ala. + +"Go to your room," said he. "You must not stay here." + +She stepped back in her surprise and faced him. + +"Every minute," he cried in a sort of exasperation, "I bid myself +remember the great gulf between you and me; every minute you forget it. +I make a curtain of your rank, your title, and--let us be frank--your +destiny; I hang the curtain up between us, and with a gentle hand you +tear it down. At the end of it all I am flesh and blood. Why did I sit +the whole long dreary day out on the bank by the roadside there? To +watch? I could not describe to you one traveller out of them all who +passed. Why, then? Ask yourself! It was not that I might stand by your +side afterwards in the glamour of an Italian night with the stars +pulsing overhead like a smile upon your lips, and all the world +whispering! You must not stay here!" + +His eyes burnt upon her; his hands shook; from head to foot he was hot +and fierce with passion, and in spite of herself she kindled to it. That +he loved she knew before, but his description of his city of dreams had +given to him in her thoughts a touch of fancifulness, had led her to +conceive of his love as something dreamlike, had somehow spiritualised +him to the hindrance of her grasp of him as flesh and blood. Thus, she +understood, she might well have seemed to be trifling with him, though +nothing was further from her thoughts. But now he was dangerous; love +had made him dangerous, and to her. She knew it, and in spite of herself +she gloried in the knowledge. Her heart leaped into her eyes and shone +there responsive, unafraid. The next moment she lowered her head. But he +had seen the unmistakable look in her eyes. Even as she stood with her +bowed head, he could not but feel that every fibre in her body thrilled; +he could not but know the transfigured expression of her face. + +"I had no thought to hurt you," she said, and her voice trembled, and it +was not with fear or any pain. Wogan took a step towards her and checked +himself. He spoke sharply between clenched teeth. + +"Lock your door," said he. + +The curtain between them was down. Wogan had patched and patched it +before; but it was torn down now, and they had seen each other without +so much as that patched semblance of a screen to veil their eyes. +Clementina did not answer him or raise her head. She went quietly into +her room. Wogan did not move until she had locked the door. + +Then he disposed himself for the night. He sat down across the top step +of the stairs with his back propped against the passage wall. Facing him +was the door of Clementina's room, on his left hand the passage with the +oil lamp burning on a bracket, stretched to the house-wall; on his right +the stairs descended straight for some steps, then turned to the left +and ran down still within view to a point where again they turned +outwards into the courtyard. Wogan saw to the priming of his pistols and +laid them beside him. He looked out to his right over the low-roofed +buildings opposite, and saw the black mountains with their glimmering +crests, and just above one spur a star which flashed with a particular +brightness. He was very tired and very cold; he drew his cloak about +him; he leaned back against the wall and watched that star. So long as +he saw that, he was awake, and therefore he watched it. At what time +sleep overtook him he could never discover. It seemed to him always that +he did not even for a second lose sight of that star. Only it dilated, +it grew brighter, it dropped towards earth, and he was not in any way +surprised. He was merely pleased with it for behaving in so attractive +and natural a way. Then, however, the strange thing happened. When the +star was hung in the air between earth and sky and nearer to the earth, +it opened like a flower and disclosed in its bright heart the face of a +girl, which was yet brighter. And that girl's face, with the broad low +brows and the dark eyes and the smile which held all earth and much of +heaven, stooped and stooped out of fire through the cool dark towards +him until her lips touched his. It was then that he woke, quietly as was +his wont, without any start, without opening his eyes, and at once he +was aware of someone breathing. + +He raised his eyelids imperceptibly and peered through his eyelashes. He +saw close beside him the lower part of a woman's frock, and it was the +frock which Clementina wore. One wild question set his heart leaping +within his breast. "Was there truth in the dream?" he asked himself; and +while he was yet formulating the question, Clementina's breathing was +suddenly arrested. It seemed to him, too, from the little that he saw +between his closed eyes, that she stiffened from head to foot. She stood +in that rigid attitude, very still. Something new had plainly occurred, +something that brought with it a shock of surprise. Wogan, without +moving his head or opening his eyes a fraction wider, looked down the +staircase and saw just above the edge of one of the steep stairs a face +watching them,--a face with bright, birdlike eyes and an indescribable +expression of cunning. + +Wogan had need of all his self-control. He felt that his eyelids were +fluttering on his cheeks, that his breath had stopped even as +Clementina's had. For the face which he saw was one quite familiar to +him, though never familiar with that expression. It was the face of an +easy-going gentleman who made up for the lack of his wit by the +heartiness of his laugh, and to whom Wogan had been drawn because of his +simplicity. There was no simplicity in Henry Whittington's face now. It +remained above the edge of the step staring at them with a look of +crafty triumph, a very image of intrigue. Then it disappeared silently. + +Wogan remembered the voice of the man who had spurred past the doorway +of the inn at Ala. He knew now why he had thought to recognise it. The +exclamation had been one of anger,--because he had seen Clementina and +himself in Italy? He had spurred onwards--towards Trent? There were +those six horses in the stables. Whittington's face had disappeared very +silently. "An honest man," thought Wogan, "does not take off his boots +before he mounts the stairs." + +Clementina was still standing at his side. Without changing his attitude +he rapped with his knuckles gently twice upon the boards of the stair. +She turned towards him with a gasp of the breath. He rapped again twice, +fearful lest she should speak to him. She understood that he had given +her the signal to go. She turned on her heel and slipped back into her +room. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +Wogan did not move. In a few minutes he heard voices whispering in the +courtyard below. By that time the Princess should have escaped into the +thicket. The stairs creaked, and again he saw a face over the edge of a +step. It was the flabby face of a stranger, who turned and whispered in +German to others behind him. The face rose; a pair of shoulders, a +portly body, and a pair of unbooted legs became visible. The man carried +a drawn sword; between his closed eyelashes Wogan saw that four others +with the like arms followed. There should have been six; but the sixth +was Harry Whittington, who, to be sure, was not likely to show himself +to Wogan awake. The five men passed the first turn of the stairs without +noise. Wogan was very well pleased with their noiselessness. Men without +boots to their feet were at a very great disadvantage when it came to a +fight. He allowed them to come up to the second turn, he allowed the +leader to ascend the last straight flight until he was almost within +sword-reach, and then he quietly rose to his feet. + +"Gentlemen," said he, "I grieve to disappoint you; but I have hired this +lodging for the night." + +The leader stopped, discountenanced, and leaned back against his +followers. "You are awake?" he stammered. + +"It is a habit of mine." + +The leader puffed out his cheeks and assumed an appearance of dignity. + +"Then we are saved some loss of time. For we were coming to awake you." + +"It was on that account, no doubt," said Wogan, folding his arms, "that +you have all taken off your boots. But, pardon me, your four friends +behind appear in spite of what I have said to be thrusting you forward. +I beg you to remain on the step on which you stand. For if you mount one +more, you will put me to the inconvenience of drawing my sword." + +Wogan leaned back idly against the wall. The Princess should now be on +the road and past the inn--unless perhaps Whittington was at watch +beneath the windows. That did not seem likely, however. Whittington +would work in the dark and not risk detection. The leader of the four +had stepped back at Wogan's words, but he said very bravely,-- + +"I warn you to use no violence to officers in discharge of their duty. +We hold a warrant for your arrest." + +"Indeed?" said Wogan, with a great show of surprise. "I cannot bring +myself to believe it. On what counts?" + +"Firstly, in that you stole away her Highness the Princess Clementina +from the Emperor's guardianship on the night of the 27th of April at +Innspruck." + +"Did I indeed do that?" said Wogan, carelessly. "Upon my word, this +cloak of mine is frayed. I had not noticed it;" and he picked at the +fringe of his cloak with some annoyance. + +"In the second place, you did kill and put to death, at a wayside inn +outside Stuttgart, one Anton Gans, servant to the Countess of Berg." + +Wogan smiled amicably. + +"I should be given a medal for that with a most beautiful ribbon of +salmon colour, I fancy, salmon or aquamarine. Which would look best, do +you think, on a coat of black velvet? I wear black velvet, as your +relations will too, my friend, if you forget which step your foot is on. +Shall we say salmon colour for the ribbon? The servant was a noxious +fellow. We will." + +The leader of the four, who had set his foot on the forbidden step, +withdrew it quickly. Wogan continued in the same quiet voice,-- + +"You say you have a warrant?" And a voice very different from his +leader's--a voice loud and decisive, which came from the last of the +four--answered him,-- + +"We have. The Emperor's warrant." + +"And how comes it," asked Wogan, "that the Emperor's warrant runs in +Venice?" + +"Because the Emperor's arm strikes in Venice," cried the hindermost +again, and he pushed past the man in front of him. + +"That we have yet to see," cried Wogan, and his sword flashed naked in +his hand. At the same moment the man who had spoken drew a pistol and +fired. He fired in a hurry; the bullet cut a groove in the rail of the +stair and flattened itself against the passage wall. + +"The Emperor's arm shakes, it seems," said Wogan, with a laugh. The +leader of the party, thrust forward by those behind him, was lifted to +the forbidden step. + +"I warned you," cried Wogan, and his sword darted out. But whether from +design or accident, the man uttered a cry and stumbled forward on his +face. Wogan's sword flashed over his shoulder, and its point sank into +the throat of the soldier behind him. That second soldier fell back, +with the blood spurting from his wound, upon the man with the smoking +pistol, who thrust him aside with an oath. + +"Make room," he cried, and lunged over the fallen leader. + +"Here's a fellow in the most desperate hurry," said Wogan, and parrying +the thrust he disengaged, circled, disengaged again, and lunging felt +the soldier's leather coat yield to his point. "The Emperor's arm is +weak, too, one might believe," he laughed, and he drove his sword home. +The man fell upon the stairs; but as Wogan spoke the leader crouched on +the step plucked violently at his cloak below his knees. Wogan had not +recovered from his lunge; the jerk at the cloak threw him off his +balance, his legs slipped forward under him, in another moment he would +have come crashing down the stairs upon his back, and at the bottom of +the flight there stood one man absolutely unharmed supporting his +comrade who had been wounded in the throat. Wogan felt the jerk, +understood the danger, and saw its remedy at the same instant. He did +not resist the impetus, he threw his body into it, he sprang from the +stairs forwards, tearing his cloak from the leader's hands, he sprang +across the leader, across the soldier who had fired at him, and he +dropped with all his weight into the arms of the third man with the +pierced throat. The blood poured out from the wound over Wogan's face +and breast in a blinding jet. The fellow uttered one choking cry and +reeling back carried the comrade who supported him against the +balustrade at the turn of the stairs. Wogan did not give that fourth man +time to disengage himself, but dropping his sword caught him by the +throat as the third wounded man slipped between them to the ground. +Wogan bent his new opponent backwards over the balustrade, and felt the +muscles of his back resist and then slacken. Wogan bent him further and +further over until it seemed his back must break. But it was the +balustrade which broke. Wogan heard it crack. He had just time to loose +his hands and step back, and the railing and the man poised on the rail +fell outwards into the courtyard. Wogan stepped forward and peered +downwards. The soldier had not broken his neck, for Wogan saw him +writhe upon the ground. He bent his head to see the better; he heard a +report behind him, and a bullet passed through the crown of his hat. He +swung round and saw the leader of the four with one of his own pistols +smoking in his hand. + +"You!" cried Wogan. "Sure, here's a rabbit attacking a terrier dog;" and +he sprang up the stairs. The man threw away the pistol, fell on his +knees, and held up his hands for mercy. + +"Now what will I do to you?" said Wogan. "Did you not fire at my back? +That's reprehensible cowardice. And with my own pistol, too, which is +sheer impertinence. What will I do with you?" The man's expression was +so pitiable, his heavy cheeks hung in such despairing folds, that Wogan +was stirred to laughter. "Well, you have put me to a deal of +inconvenience," said he; "but I will be merciful, being strong, being +most extraordinary strong. I'll send you back to your master the Emperor +with a message from me that four men are no manner of use at all. Come +in here for a bit." + +Wogan took the unfortunate man and led him into the parlour. Then he lit +a lamp, and making his captive sit where he could see any movement that +he made, he wrote a very polite note to his Most Catholic Majesty the +Emperor wherein he pointed out that it was a cruel thing to send four +poor men who had never done harm to capture Charles Wogan; that no King +or Emperor before who had wanted to capture Charles Wogan, of whom there +were already many, and by God's grace he hoped there would be more, had +ever despatched less than a regiment of horse upon so hazardous an +expedition; and that when Captain O'Toole might be expected to be +standing side by side with Wogan, it was usually thought necessary to +add seven batteries of artillery and a field marshal. Wogan thereupon +went on to point out that Peri was in Venetian territory, which his Most +Catholic Majesty had violated, and that Charles Wogan would accordingly +feel it his bounden duty not to sleep night or day until he had made a +confederation of Italian states to declare war and captivity upon his +Most Catholic Majesty. Wogan concluded with the assurances of his +profoundest respects and was much pleased by his letter, which he sealed +and compelled his prisoner upon his knees to promise to deliver into the +Emperor's own hands. + +"Now where is that pretty warrant?" said Wogan, as soon as this +important function was accomplished. + +"It is signed by the Governor of Trent," said the man. + +"Who in those regions is the Emperor's deputy. Hand it over." + +The man handed it over reluctantly. + +"Now," continued Wogan, "here is paper and ink and a chair. Sit down and +write a full confession of your audacious incursion into a friendly +country, and just write, if you please, how much you paid the landlady +to hear nothing of what was doing." + +"You will not force me to that," cried the fellow. + +"By no means. The confession must be voluntary and written of your own +free will. So write it, my friend, without any compulsion whatever, or +I'll throw you out of the window." + +Then followed a deal of sighing and muttering. But the confession was +written and handed to Wogan, who glanced over it. + +"But there's an omission," said he. "You make mention of only five men." + +"There were only five men on the staircase." + +"But there are six horses in the stables. Will you be good enough to +write down at what hour on what day Mr. Harry Whittington knocked at the +Governor's door in Trent and told the poor gout-ridden man that the +Princess and Mr. Wogan had put up at the Cervo Inn at Ala." + +The soldier turned a startled face on Wogan. + +"So you knew!" he cried. + +"Oh, I knew," answered Wogan, suddenly. "Look at me! Did you ever see +eyes so heavy with want of sleep, a face so worn by it, a body so jerked +upon strings like a showman's puppet? Write, I tell you! We who serve +the King are trained to wakefulness. Write! I am in haste!" + +"Yet your King does not reign!" said the man, wonderingly, and he wrote. +He wrote the truth about Harry Whittington; for Wogan was looking over +his shoulder. + +"Did he pay you to keep silence as to his share in the business?" asked +Wogan, as the man scattered some sand over the paper. "There is no word +of it in your handwriting." + +The man added a sentence and a figure. + +"That will do," said Wogan. "I may need it for a particular purpose;" +and he put the letter carefully away in the pocket of his coat. "For a +very particular purpose," he added. "It will be well for you to convey +your party back with all haste to Trent. You are on the wrong side of +the border." + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +Wogan went from the parlour and climbed out of the house by the +rope-ladder. He left it hanging at the window and walked up the +glimmering road, a ribbon of ghostly white between dim hills. It was +then about half-past twelve of the night, and not a feather of cloud +stained the perfection of the sky. It curved above his head spangled +like a fair lady's fan, and unfathomably blue like Clementina's eyes +when her heart stirred in their depths. He reached the little footway +and turned into the upward cleft of the hills. He walked now into the +thick night of a close-grown clump of dwarf-oaks, which weaved so dense +a thatch above his head that he knocked against the boles. The trees +thinned, he crossed here and there a dimpled lawn in the pure starshine, +he traversed a sparse grove of larches in the dreamy twilight, he came +out again upon the grassy lip of a mountain torrent which henceforth +kept him company, and which, speaking with many voices, seemed a friend +trying to catch his mood. For here it leaped over an edge of rock, and +here in a tiny waterfall, and splashed into a pellucid pool, and the +reverberating noise filled the dell with a majestic din; there it ran +smoothly kissing its banks with a murmur of contentment, embosoming the +stars; beyond, it chafed hoarsely between narrow walls; and again half a +mile higher up it sang on shallows and evaded the stones with a tinkling +laugh. But Wogan was deaf to the voices; he mounted higher, the trees +ceased, he came into a desolate country of boulders; and the higher he +ascended, the more heavily he walked. He stopped and washed his face and +hands clean of blood-stains in the stream. Above him and not very far +away was the lonely hut. + +He came upon it quite suddenly. For the path climbed steeply at the +back, and slipping from the mouth of a narrow gully he stood upon the +edge of a small plateau in the centre of which stood the cabin, a little +house of pinewood built with some decoration and elegance. One unglazed +window was now unshuttered, and the light from a lantern streamed out of +it in a yellow fan, marking the segment of a circle upon the rough rocky +ground and giving to the dusk of the starshine a sparkle of gold. +Through the window Wogan could see into the room. It was furnished +simply, but with an eye to comfort. He saw too the girl he had dared to +bear off from the thick of a hostile town. She was lying upon a couch, +her head resting upon her folded arms. She was asleep, and in a place +most solitary. Behind the cabin rose a black forest of pines, pricking +the sky with their black spires, and in front of it the ground fell +sharply to the valley, in which no light gleamed; beyond the valley rose +the dim hills again. Nor was there any sound except the torrent. The +air at this height was keen and fresh with a smell of primeval earth. +Wogan hitched his cloak about his throat, and his boots rang upon the +rock. The Princess raised her head; Wogan walked to the door and stood +for a little with his hand upon the latch. He lifted it and entered. +Clementina looked at him for a moment, and curiously. She had no +questions as to how his struggle with the Governor of Trent's emissaries +had fared. Wogan could understand by some unspoken sympathy that that +matter had no place in her thoughts. She stood up in an attitude of +expectation. + +"It grows towards morning?" said she. + +"In two hours we shall have the dawn," he replied; and there was a +silence between them. + +"You found this cabin open?" said Wogan. + +"The door was latched. I loosed a shutter. The night is very still." + +"One might fancy there were no others alive but you and me across all +the width of the world." + +"One could wish it," she said beneath her breath, and crossed to the +window where she stayed, breathing the fresh night. The sigh, however, +had reached to Wogan's ears. He took his pistols from his belt, and to +engage his thoughts, loaded the one which had been fired at him. After a +little he looked up and saw that Clementina's eyes dwelt upon him with +that dark steady look, which held always so much of mystery and told +always one thing plainly, her lack of fear. And she said suddenly,-- + +"There was trouble at Peri. I climbed from the window. I had almost +forgotten. As I ran down the road past the open court, I saw a little +group of men gathered about the foot of the staircase! I was in two +minds whether to come back and load your pistols or to obey you. I +obeyed, but I was in much fear for you. I had almost forgotten, it seems +so long ago. Tell me! You conquered; it is no new thing. Tell me how!" + +She did not move from the window, she kept her eyes fixed upon Wogan +while he told his story, but it was quite clear to him that she did not +hear one half of it. And when he had done she said,-- + +"How long is it till the morning?" + +Wogan had spun his tale out, but half an hour enclosed it, from the +beginning to the end. He became silent again; but he was aware at once +that silence was more dangerous than speech, for in the silence he could +hear both their hearts speaking. He began hurriedly to talk of their +journey, and there could be no more insidious topic for him to light +upon. For he spoke of the Road, and he had already been given a warning +that to the romance of the Road her heart turned like a compass-needle +to the north. They were both gipsies, for all that they had no Egyptian +blood. That southward road from Innspruck was much more than a mere +highway of travel between a starting-place and a goal, even to these two +to whom the starting-place meant peril and the goal the first +opportunity of sleep. + +"Even in our short journey," said Clementina, "how it climbed hillsides +angle upon angle, how it swept through the high solitudes of ice where +no trees grow, where silence lives; how it dropped down into green +valleys and the noise of streams! And it still sweeps on, through dark +and light, a glimmer at night, a glare in the midday, between lines of +poplars, hidden amongst vines, through lighted cities, down to Venice +and the sea. If one could travel it, never retracing a step, pitching a +tent by the roadside when one willed! That were freedom!" She stopped +with a remarkable abruptness. She turned her eyes out of the window for +a little. Then again she asked,-- + +"How long till morning?" + +"But one more hour." + +She came back into the room and seated herself at the table. + +"You gave me some hint at Innspruck of an adventurous ride from Ohlau," +and she drew her breath sharply at the word, as though the name with all +its associations struck her a blow, "into Strasbourg. Tell me its +history. So will this hour pass." + +He told her as he walked about the room, though his heart was not in the +telling, nor hers in the hearing, until he came to relate the story of +his escape from the inn a mile or so beyond Stuttgart. He described how +he hid in the garden, how he crossed the rich level of lawn to the +lighted window, how to his surprise he was admitted without a question +by an old bookish gentleman--and thereupon he ceased so suddenly that +Clementina turned her head aside and listened. + +"Did you hear a step?" she asked in a low voice. + +"No." + +And they both listened. No noise came to their ears but the brawling of +the torrent. That, however, filled the room, drowning all the natural +murmurs of the night. + +"Indeed, one would not hear a company of soldiers," said Clementina. She +crossed to the window. + +"Yet you heard my step, and it waked you," said Wogan, as he followed +her. + +"I listened for it in my sleep," said she. + +For a second time that night they stood side by side looking upon +darkness and the spangled sky. Only there was no courtyard with its +signs of habitation. Clementina drew herself away suddenly from the +sill. Wogan at once copied her example. + +"You saw--?" he began. + +"No one," said she, bending her dark eyes full upon him. "Will you close +the shutter?" + +Wogan drew back instinctively. He had a sense that this open window, +though there was no one to spy through it, was in some way a security. +Suppose that he closed it! That mere act of shutting himself and her +apart, though it gave not one atom more of privacy, still had a +semblance of giving it. He was afraid. He said,-- + +"There is no need. Who should spy on us? What would it matter if we were +spied upon?" + +"I ask you to close that shutter." + +From the quiet, level voice he could infer nothing of the thought behind +the request; and her unwavering eyes told him nothing. + +"Why?" + +"Because I am afraid, as you are," said she, and she shivered. "You +would not have it shut. I am afraid while it stays open. There is too +much expectation in the night. Those great black pines stand waiting; +the stars are very bright and still, they wait, holding their breath. It +seems to me the whirl of the earth has stopped. Never was there a night +so hushed in expectation;" and these words too she spoke without a +falter or a lifting note, breathing easily like a child asleep, and not +changing her direct gaze from Wogan's face. "I am afraid," she +continued, "of you and me. I am the more afraid;" and Wogan set the +shutter in its place and let the bar fall. Clementina with a breath of +relief came back to her seat at the table. + +"How long is it till dawn?" she said. + +"We have half an hour," said Wogan. + +"Well, that old man--Count von Ahlen, you said--received you, heaped +logs upon his fire, stanched your wounds, and asked no questions. Well? +You stopped suddenly. Tell me all!" + +Wogan looked doubtfully at her and then quickly seated himself over +against her. + +"All? I will. It will be no new thing to you;" and as Clementina raised +her eyes curiously to his, he met her gaze and so spoke the rest +looking at her with her own direct gaze. + +"Why did he ask no question, seeing me disordered, wounded, a bandit, +for all he knew, with a murder on my hands? Because thirty years before +Count Philip Christopher von Koenigsmarck had come in just that same way +over the lawn to the window, and had sat by that log-fire and charmed +the old gentleman into an envy by his incomparable elegance and wit." + +"Koenigsmarck!" exclaimed the girl. She knew the history of that +brilliant and baleful adventurer at the Court of Hanover. "He came as +you did, and wounded?" + +"The Princess Sophia Dorothea was visiting the Duke of Wuertemberg," +Wogan explained, and Clementina nodded. + +"Count Otto von Ahlen, my host," he continued, "had a momentary thought +that I was Koenigsmarck mysteriously returned as he had mysteriously +vanished; and through these thirty years' retention of his youth, Count +Otto could never think of Koenigsmarck but as a man young and tossed in a +froth of passion. He would have it to the end that I had escaped from +such venture as had Koenigsmarck; he would have it my wounds were the +mere offset to a love well worth them; he _would_ envy me. 'Passion,' +said he, 'without passion there can be no great thing.'" + +"And the saying lived in your thoughts," cried Clementina. "I do not +wonder. 'Without passion there can be no great thing!' Can books teach +a man so much?" + +"Nay, it was an hour's talk with Koenigsmarck which set the old man's +thoughts that way; and though Koenigsmarck talked never so well, I would +not likely infer from his talk an eternal and universal truth. Count +Otto left me alone while he fetched me food, and he left me in a panic." + +"A panic?" said Clementina, with a little laugh. "You!" + +"Yes. That first mistake of me for Koenigsmarck, that insistence that my +case was Koenigsmarck's--" + +"There was a shadow of truth in it--even then?" said Clementina, +suddenly leaning across the table towards him. Wogan strove not to see +the light of her joy suddenly sparkling in her eyes. + +"I sat alone, feeling the ghost of Koenigsmarck in the room with me," he +resumed quickly, and his voice dropped, and he looked round the little +cabin. Clementina looked round quickly too. Then their eyes met again. +"I heard his voice menacing me. 'For love of a queen I lived. For love +of a queen I died most horribly; and it would have gone better with the +queen had she died the same death at the same time--'" And Clementina +interrupted him with a cry which was fierce. + +"Ah, who can say that, and know it for the truth--except the Queen? You +must ask her in her prison at Ahlden, and that you cannot do. She has +her memories maybe. Maybe she has built herself within these thirty +years a world of thought so real, it makes her gaolers shadows, and +that prison a place of no account, save that it gives her solitude and +is so more desirable than a palace. I can imagine it;" and then she +stopped, and her voice dropped to the low tone which Wogan had used. + +"You looked round you but now and most fearfully. Is Koenigsmarck's +spirit here?" + +"No," exclaimed Wogan; "I would to God it were! I would I felt its +memories chilling me as they chilled me that night! But I cannot. I +cannot as much as hear a whisper. All the heavens are dumb," he cried. + +"And the earth waits," said Clementina. + +She did not move, neither did Wogan. They both sat still as statues. +They had come to the great crisis of their destiny. A change of posture, +a gesture, an assumed expression which might avert the small, the merely +awkward indiscretions of the tongue, they both knew to be futile. It was +in the mind of each of them that somehow without their participation the +truth would out that night; for the dawn was so long in coming. + +"All the way up from Peri," said Wogan, suddenly, "I strove to make real +to myself the ignominy, the odium, the scandal." + +"But you could not," said Clementina, with a nod of comprehension, as +though that inability was a thing familiar to her. + +"When I reached the hut, and saw that fan of light spreading from the +window, as it spread over the lawn beyond Stuttgart, I remembered Otto +von Ahlen and his talk of Koenigsmarck. I tried to hear the menaces." + +"But you could not." + +"No. I saw you through the window," he cried, "stretched out upon that +couch, supple and young and sweet. I saw the lamplight on your hair, +searching out the gold in its dark brown. I could only remember how +often I have at nights wakened and reached out my hands in the vain +dream that they would meet in its thick coils, that I should feel its +silk curl and nestle about my fingers. There's the truth out, though +it's a familiar truth to you ever since I held you in my arms beneath +the stars upon the road to Ala." + +"It was known to me a day before," said she; "but it was known to you so +long ago as that night in the garden." + +"Oh, before then," cried Wogan. + +"When? Let the whole truth be known, since we know so much." + +"Why, on that first day at Ohlau." + +"In the great hall. I stood by the fire and raised my head, and our eyes +met. I do remember." + +"But I had no thought ever to let you know. I was the King's +man-at-arms, as I am now;" and he burst into a harsh laugh. "Here's +madness! The King's man-at-arms dumps him down in the King's chair! I +had a thought to live to you, if you understand, as a man writes a poem +to his mistress, to make my life the poem, an unsigned poem that you +would never read, and yet unsigned, unread, would make its creator glad +and fill his days. And here's the poem!" and at that a great cry of +terror leaped from Clementina's lips and held them both aghast. + +Wogan had risen from his seat; with a violent gesture he had thrown back +his cloak, and his coat beneath was stained and dark with blood. +Clementina stood opposite to him, all her quiet and her calmness gone. +There was no longer any mystery in her eyes. Her bosom rose and fell; +she pointed a trembling hand towards his breast. + +"You are hurt. Again for love of me you are hurt." + +"It is not my wound," he answered. "It is blood I spilt for you;" he +took a step towards her, and in a second she was between his arms, +sobbing with all the violence of passion which she had so long +restrained. Wogan was wrung by it. That she should weep at all was a +thought strange to him; that he should cause the tears was a sorrow +which tortured him. He touched her hair with his lips, he took her by +the arms and would have set her apart; but she clung to him, hiding her +face, and the sobs shook her. Her breast was strained against him, he +felt the beating of her heart, a fever ran through all his blood. And as +he held her close, a queer inconsequential thought came into his mind. +It shocked him, and he suddenly held her off. + +"The blood upon my coat is wet," he cried. The odium, the scandal of a +flight which would make her name a byword from London to Budapest, that +he could envisage; but that this blood upon his coat should stain the +dress she wore--no! He saw indeed that the bodice was smeared a dark +red. + +"See, the blood stains you!" he cried. + +"Why, then, I share it," she answered with a ringing voice of pride. "I +share it with you;" and she smiled through her tears and a glowing blush +brightened upon her face. She stood before him, erect and beautiful. +Through Wogan's mind there tripped a procession of delicate ladies who +would swoon gracefully at the sight of a pricked finger. + +"That's John Sobieski speaking," he exclaimed, and with an emphasis of +despair, "Poland's King! But I was mad! Indeed, I blame myself." + +"Blame!" she cried passionately, her whole nature rising in revolt +against the word. "Are we to blame? We are man and woman. Who shall cast +the stone? Are you to blame for that you love me? Who shall blame you? +Not I, who thank you from my heart. Am I to blame? What have we hearts +for, then, if not to love? I have a thought--it may be very wrong. I do +not know. I do not trouble to think--that I should be much more to blame +did I not love you too. There's the word spoken at the last," and she +lowered her head. + +Even at that moment her gesture struck upon Wogan as strange. It +occurred to him that he had never before seen her drop her eyes from +his. He had an intuitive fancy that she would never do it but as a +deliberate token of submission. Nor was he wrong. Her next words told +him it was her white flag of surrender. + +"I believe the spoken truth is best," she said simply in a low voice +which ever so slightly trembled. "Unspoken and yet known by both of us, +I think it would breed thoughts and humours we are best without. +Unspoken our eyes would question, each to other, at every meeting; there +would be no health in our thoughts. But here's the truth out, and I am +glad--in whichever way you find its consequence." + +She stood before him with her head bent. She made no movement save with +her hands, which worked together slowly and gently. + +"In whichever way--I--?" repeated Wogan. + +"Yes," she answered. "There is Bologna. Say that Bologna is our goal. I +shall go with you to Bologna. There is Venice and the sea. Bid me go, +then; hoist a poor scrap of a sail in an open boat. I shall adventure +over the wide seas with you. What will you do?" + +Wogan drew a long breath. The magnitude of the submission paralysed him. +The picture which she evoked was one to blind him as with a glory of +sunlight. He remained silent for a while. Then he said timidly,-- + +"There is Ohlau." + +The girl shivered. The name meant her father, her mother, their grief, +the disgrace upon her home. But she answered only with her question,-- + +"What will you do?" + +"You would lose a throne," he said, and even while he spoke was aware +that such a plea had not with her now the weight of thistledown. + +"You would become the mock of Europe,--you that are its wonder;" and he +saw the corner of her lip curve in a smile of scorn. + +"What will you do?" she asked, and he ceased to argue. It was he who +must decide; she willed it so. He turned towards the door of the hut and +opened it. As he passed through, he heard her move behind, and looking +over his shoulder, he saw that she leaned down upon the table and kissed +the pistol which he had left loaded there. He stepped out of the cabin +and closed the door behind him. + +The dark blue of the sky had faded to a pure and pearly colour; a +colourless grey light invaded it; the pale stars were drowning; and all +about him the trees shivered to the morning. Wogan walked up and down +that little plateau, torn by indecision. Inside the sheltered cabin sat +waiting the girl, whose destiny was in his hands. He had a sentence to +speak, and by it the flow of all her years would be irrevocably ordered. +She had given herself over to him,--she, with her pride, her courage, +her endurance. Wogan had seen too closely into her heart to bring any +foolish charge of unmaidenliness against her. No, the very completeness +of her submission raised her to a higher pinnacle. If she gave herself, +she did so without a condition or a reserve, body and bone, heart and +soul. Wogan knew amongst the women of his time many who made their +bargain with the world, buying a semblance of esteem with a double +payment of lies. This girl stood apart from them. She loved, therefore +she entrusted herself simply to the man she loved, and bade him dispose +of her. That very simplicity was another sign of her strength. She was +the more priceless on account of it. He went back into the hut. Through +the chinks of the shutter the morning stretched a grey finger; the room +was filled with a vaporous twilight. + +"We travel to Bologna," said he. "I will not have you wasted. Other +women may slink into kennels and stop their ears--not you. The King is +true to you. You are for the King." + +As she had not argued before, she did not argue now. She nodded her head +and fastened her cloak about her throat. She followed him out of the hut +and down the gorge. In the northeast the sky already flamed, and the sun +was up before they reached the road. They walked silently towards Peri, +and Wogan was wondering whether in her heart she despised him when she +stopped. + +"I am to marry the King," said she. + +"Yes," said Wogan. + +"But you?" she said with her brows in a frown; "there is no compulsion +on you to marry--anyone." + +Wogan was relieved of his fears. He broke into a laugh, to which she +made no reply. She still waited frowning for his answer. + +"No woman," he said, "will ride on my black horse into my city of +dreams. You may be very sure I will not marry." + +"No. I would not have you married." + +Wogan laughed again, but Clementina was very serious. That she had no +right to make any such claim did not occur to her. She was merely +certain and resolved that Wogan must not marry. She did not again refer +to the matter, nor could she so have done had she wished. For a little +later and while they were not yet come to Peri, they were hailed from +behind, and turning about they saw Gaydon and O'Toole riding after them. +O'Toole had his story to tell. Gaydon and he had put the courier to bed +and taken his clothes and his money, and after the fellow had waked up, +they had sat for a day in the bedroom keeping him quiet and telling the +landlord he was very ill. O'Toole finished his story as they came to +Peri. They went boldly to the Cervo Inn, where all traces of the night's +conflict had been removed, and neither Wogan nor the landlady thought it +prudent to make any mention of the matter; they waited for Misset and +his wife, who came the next day. And thus reunited they passed one +evening into the streets of Bologna and stopped at the Pilgrim Inn. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +In the parlour of the Pilgrim Inn the four friends took their leave of +the Princess. She could not part from them lightly; she spoke with a +faltering voice:-- + +"Five days ago I was in prison at Innspruck, perpetually harassed and +with no hope of release but in you. Now I am in Bologna, and free. I +could not believe that any girl could find such friends except in +fairyland. You make the world very sweet and clean to me. I should thank +you. See my tears fall! Will you take them for my thanks? I have no +words which can tell as much of my thoughts towards you. My little woman +I keep with me, but to you gentlemen I would gladly give a token each, +so that you may know I will never forget, and so that you too may keep +for me a home within your memories." To Major Gaydon she gave a ring +from off her finger, to Captain Misset a chain which she wore about her +neck, to O'Toole, "her six feet four," as she said between laughter and +tears, her watch. Each with a word of homage took his leave. Clementina +spoke to Wogan last of all, and when the room was empty but for these +two. + +"To you, my friend," said she, "I give nothing. There is no need. But I +ask for something. I would be in debt to you still deeper than I am. I +ask for a handkerchief which I dropped from my shoulders one evening +under the stars upon the road to Ala." + +Wogan bowed to her without a word. He drew the handkerchief from his +breast slowly. + +"It is true," said he; "I have no right to it;" and he gave it back. But +his voice showed that he was hurt. + +"You do not understand," said she, with a great gentleness. "You have +every right which the truest loyalty can confer. I ask you for this +handkerchief, because I think at times to wear it in memory of a white +stone on which I could safely set my foot, for the stone was not straw." + +Wogan could not trust his voice to answer her. He took her hand to lift +it to his lips. + +"No," said she; "as at Innspruck, an honest handclasp, if you please." + +Wogan joined his three companions in the road, and they stood together +for a little, recounting to one another the incidents of the flight. + +"Here's a great work ended," said Gaydon at last. + +"We shall be historical," said O'Toole. "It is my one ambition. I want +to figure in the history-books and be a great plague and nuisance to +children at school. I would sooner be cursed daily by schoolboys than +have any number of golden statues in galleries. It means the more solid +reputation;" and then he became silent. Gaydon had, besides his joy at +the rescue of Clementina, a private satisfaction that matters which were +none of his business had had no uncomfortable issue. Misset, too, was +thankful for that his wife had come safely to the journey's end. O'Toole +alone had a weight upon his mind; and when Gaydon said, "Well, we may go +to bed and sleep without alarms till sundown to-morrow," he remarked,-- + +"There's Jenny. It was on my account she ventured with us." + +"That's true," said Wogan; "but we shall put an end to her captivity, +now we are safe at Bologna. I have friends here who can serve me so far, +I have no doubt." + +O'Toole was willing to leave the matter in Wogan's hands. If Wogan once +pledged himself to Jenny's release, why, Jenny _was_ released; and he +went to bed now with a quite equable mind. Wogan hurried off to the +palace of the Cardinal Origo, whom he found sitting at his supper. The +Cardinal welcomed Wogan back very warmly. + +"I trust, your Eminence," said Wogan, "that Farini is now at Bologna." + +"You come in the nick of time," replied the Cardinal. "This is his last +week. There is a great demand for the seats; but you will see to it, Mr. +Wogan, that the box is in the first tier." + +"There was to be a dinner, too, if I recollect aright. I have not dined +for days. Your Eminence, I shall be extraordinarily hungry." + +"You will order what you will, Mr. Wogan. I am a man of a small +appetite and have no preferences." + +"Your Eminence's cook will be the better judge of what is seasonable. +Your Eminence will be the more likely to secure the box in the first +tier. Shall we fix a day? To-morrow, if it please you. To-morrow I shall +have the honour, then, to be your Eminence's guest." + +The Cardinal started up from the table and stared at his visitor. + +"You are jesting," said he. + +"So little," replied Wogan, "that her Highness, the Princess Clementina, +is now at the Pilgrim Inn at Bologna." + +"In Bologna!" cried the Cardinal; and he stood frowning in a great +perturbation of spirit. "This is great news," he said, but in a doubtful +voice which Wogan did not understand. "This is great news, to be sure;" +and he took a turn or two across the room. + +"Not wholly pleasant news, one might almost think," said Wogan, in some +perplexity. + +"Never was better news," exclaimed the Cardinal, hastily,--a trifle too +hastily, it seemed to Wogan. "But it surprises one. Even the King did +not expect this most desirable issue. For the King's in Spain. It is +that which troubles me. Her Highness comes to Bologna, and the King's in +Spain." + +"Yes," said Wogan, with a wary eye upon his Eminence. "Why is the King +in Spain?" + +"There is pressing business in Spain,--an expedition from Cadiz. The +King's presence there was urged most earnestly. He had no hope you would +succeed. I myself have some share in the blame. I did not hide from you +my thought, Mr. Wogan." + +Wogan was not all reassured. He could not but remember that the excuse +for the King's absence which the Cardinal now made to him was precisely +that which he himself had invented to appease Clementina at Innspruck. +It was the simple, natural excuse which came first of all to the +tongue's tip, but--but it did not satisfy. There was, besides, too much +flurry and agitation in the Cardinal's manner. Even now that he was +taking snuff, he spilled the most of it from the trembling of his +fingers. Moreover, he must give reason upon reason for his perturbation +the while he let his supper get cold. + +"Her Highness I cannot but feel will have reason to think slightly of +our welcome. A young girl, she will expect, and rightly, something more +of ceremony as her due." + +"Your Eminence does not know her," interrupted Wogan, with some +sharpness. His Eminence was adroit enough to seize the occasion of +ending a conversation which was growing with every minute more +embarrassing. + +"I shall make haste to repair my defect," said he. "I beg you to present +my duty to her Highness and to request her to receive me to-morrow at +ten. By that, I will hope to have discovered a lodging more suitable to +her dignity." + +Wogan made his prayer for the Pope's intervention on Jenny's behalf and +then returned to the Pilgrim Inn, dashed and fallen in spirit. He had +thought that their troubles were at an end, but here was a new +difficulty at which in truth he rather feared to guess. The Chevalier's +departure to Spain had been a puzzle to him before; he remembered now +that the Chevalier had agreed with reluctance to his enterprise, and had +never been more than lukewarm in its support. That reluctance, that +lukewarmness, he had attributed to a natural habit of discouragement; +but the evasiveness of Cardinal Origo seemed to propose a different +explanation. Wogan would not guess at it. + +"The King is to marry the Princess," said he, fiercely. "I brought her +out of Innspruck to Bologna. The King must marry the Princess;" and, +quite unawares, he set off running towards the inn. As he drew near to +it, he heard a confused noise of shouting. He quickened his pace, and +rushing out of the mouth of a side street into the square where the inn +stood, came suddenly to a stop. The square was filled with a great mob +of people, and in face of the inn the crowd was so thick Wogan could +have walked upon the shoulders. Many of the people carried blazing +torches, which they waved in the air, dropping the burning resin upon +their companions; others threw their hats skywards; here were boys +beating drums, and grown men blowing upon toy trumpets; and all were +shouting and cheering with a deafening enthusiasm. The news of the +Princess's arrival had spread like wildfire through the town. Wogan's +spirits rose at a bound. Here was a welcome very different from the +Cardinal's. Wogan rejoiced in the good sense of the citizens of Bologna +who could appreciate the great qualities of his chosen woman. Their +enthusiasm did them credit; he could have embraced them one by one. + +He strove to push his way towards the door, but he would hardly have +pierced through that throng had not a man by the light of a torch +recognised him and bawled out his name. He was lifted shoulder high in a +second; he was passed from hand to hand over the heads of the people; he +was set tenderly down in the very doorway of the Pilgrim Inn, and he +found Clementina at the window of an unlighted room gazing unperceived +at the throng. + +"Here's a true welcome, madam," said he, cordially, with his thoughts +away upon that bluff of hillside where the acclamations had seemed so +distant and unreal. It is possible that they seemed of small account to +Clementina now, for though they rang in ears and were visible to her +eyes, she sat quite unmoved by them. + +"This is one tiny square in a little town," he continued. "But its +shouts will ring across Europe;" and she turned her head to him and said +quietly,-- + +"The King is still in Spain, is he not?" + +Wogan's enthusiasm was quenched in alarm. Her voice had rung, for all +its quietude, with pride. What if she guessed what he for one would not +let his wildest fancy dwell upon? Wogan repeated to himself the resolve +which he had made, though with an alteration. "The King must marry the +Princess," he had said; now he said, "The Princess must marry the King." + +He began hurriedly to assure her that the King had doubted his capacity +to bring the enterprise to a favourable issue, but that now he would +without doubt return. Cardinal Origo would tell her more upon that head +if she would be good enough to receive him at ten in the morning; and +while Wogan was yet speaking, a torch waved, and amongst that +close-pressed throng of faces below him in the street, one sprang to his +view with a remarkable distinctness, a face most menacing and +vindictive. It was the face of Harry Whittington. Just for a second it +shone out, angles and lines so clearly revealed that it was as though +the crowd had vanished, and that one contorted face glared alone at the +windows in a flare of hell-fire. + +Clementina saw the face too, for she drew back instinctively within the +curtains of the window. + +"The man at Peri," said she, in a whisper. + +"Your Highness will pardon me," exclaimed Wogan, and he made a movement +towards the door. Then he stopped, hesitated for a second, and came +back. He had a question to put, as difficult perhaps as ever lips had to +frame. + +"At Peri," he said in a stumbling voice, "I waked from a dream and saw +that man, bird-like and cunning, watching over the rim of the stairs. I +was dreaming that a star out of heaven stooped towards me, that a +woman's face shone out of the star's bright heart, that her lips deigned +to bend downwards to my earth. And I wonder, I wonder whether those +cunning eyes had cunning enough to interpret my dream." + +And Clementina answered him simply,-- + +"I think it very likely that they had so much skill;" and Wogan ran down +the stairs into the street. He forced his way through the crowd to the +point where Whittington's face had shown, but his hesitation, his +question, had consumed time. Whittington had vanished. Nor did he appear +again for some while in Bologna. Wogan searched for him high and low. +Here was another difficulty added to the reluctance of his King, the +pride of his Queen. Whittington had a piece of dangerous knowledge, and +could not be found. Wogan said nothing openly of the man's treachery, +though he kept very safely the paper in which that treachery was +confessed. But he did not cease from his search. He was still engaged +upon it when he received the summons from Cardinal Origo. He hurried to +the palace, wondering what new thing had befallen, and was at once +admitted to the Cardinal. It was no bad thing, at all events, as Wogan +could judge from the Cardinal's smiling face. + +"Mr. Wogan," said he, "our Holy Father the Pope wishes to testify his +approbation of your remarkable enterprise on behalf of a princess who is +his god-daughter. He bids me hand you, therefore, your patent of Roman +Senator, and request you to present yourself at the Capitol in Rome on +June 15, when you will be installed with all the ancient ceremonies." + +Wogan thanked his Eminence dutifully, but laid the patent on the table. + +"You hardly know what you refuse," said his Eminence. "The Holy Father +has no greater honour to bestow, and, believe me, he bestows it +charily." + +"Nay, your Eminence," said Wogan, "I do not undervalue so high a +distinction. But I had three friends with me who shared every danger. I +cannot accept an honour which they do not share; for indeed they risked +more than I did. For they hold service under the King of France." + +The Cardinal was pleased to compliment Wogan upon his loyalty to his +friends. + +"They shall not be the losers," said he. "I think I may promise indeed +that each will have a step in rank, and I do not doubt that when the +Holy Father hears what you have said to me, I shall have three other +patents like to this;" and he locked Wogan's away in a drawer. + +"And what of the King in Spain?" asked Wogan. + +"I sent a messenger thither on the night of your coming," said the +Cardinal; "but it is a long journey into Spain. We must wait." + +To Wogan it seemed the waiting would never end. The Cardinal had found +a little house set apart from the street with a great garden of lawns +and cedar-trees and laurels; and in that garden now fresh with spring +flowers and made private by high walls, the Princess passed her days. +Wogan saw her but seldom during this time, but each occasion sent him +back to his lodging in a fever of anxiety. She had grown silent, and her +silence alarmed him. She had lost the sparkling buoyancy of her spirits. +Mrs. Misset, who attended her, told him that she would sit for long +whiles with a red spot burning in each cheek. Wogan feared that her +pride was chafing her gentleness, that she guessed there was reluctance +in the King's delay. "But she must marry the King," he still persevered +in declaring. Her hardships, her imprisonment, her perilous escape, the +snows of Innspruck,--these were known now; and if at the last the end +for which they had been endured--Wogan broke off from his reflections to +hear the world laughing. The world would not think; it would laugh. "For +her own sake she must marry," he cried, as he paced about his rooms. +"For ours, too, for a country's sake;" and he looked northwards towards +England. But "for her own sake" was the reason uppermost in his +thoughts. + +But the days passed. The three promised patents came from Rome, and +Cardinal Origo unlocked the drawer and joined Wogan's to them. He +presented all four at the same time. + +"The patents carry the titles of 'Excellency,'" said he. + +O'Toole beamed with delight. + +"Sure," said he, "I will have a toga with the arms of the O'Tooles +embroidered on the back, to appear in at the Capitol. It is on June 15, +your Eminence. Upon my soul, I have not much time;" and he grew +thoughtful. + +"A toga will hardly take a month, even with the embroidery, which I do +not greatly recommend," said the Cardinal, drily. + +"I was not at the moment thinking of the toga," said O'Toole, gloomily. + +"And what of the King in Spain?" asked Wogan. + +"We must wait, my friend," said the Cardinal. + +In a week there was brought to Wogan one morning a letter in the King's +hand. He fingered it for a little, not daring to break the seal. When he +did break it, he read a great many compliments upon his success, and +after the compliments a statement that the marriage should take place at +Montefiascone as soon as the King could depart from Spain, and after +that statement, a declaration that since her Highness's position was not +meanwhile one that suited either her dignity or the love the King had +for her, a marriage by proxy should take place at Bologna. The Chevalier +added that he had written to Cardinal Origo to make the necessary +arrangements for the ceremony, and he appointed herewith Mr. Charles +Wogan to act as his proxy, in recognition of his great services. + +Wogan felt a natural distaste for the part he was to take in the +ceremony. To stand up before the Cardinal and take Clementina's hand in +his, and speak another's marriage vows and receive hers as another's +deputy,--there was a certain mockery in the situation for which he had +no liking. The memory of the cabin on the mountain-side was something +too near. But, at all events, the King was to marry the Princess, and +Wogan's distaste was swallowed up in a great relief. There would be no +laughter rippling over Europe like the wind over a field of corn. He +stood by his window in the spring sunshine with a great contentment of +spirit, and then there came a loud rapping on his door. + +He caught his breath; he grew white with a sudden fear; you would have +thought it was his heart that was knocked upon. For there was another +side to the business. The King would marry the Princess; but how would +the Princess take this marriage by proxy and the King's continued +absence? She had her pride, as he knew well. The knocking was repeated. +Wogan in a voice of suspense bade his visitor enter. The visitor was one +of her Highness's new servants. "Without a doubt," thought Wogan, "she +has received a letter by the same messenger who brought me mine." + +The servant handed him a note from the Princess, begging him to attend +on her at once. "She must marry the King," said Wogan to himself. He +took his hat and cane, and followed the servant into the street. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +Wogan was guided through the streets to the mouth of a blind alley, at +the bottom of which rose a high garden wall, and over the wall the +smoking chimneys of a house among the tops of many trees freshly green, +which shivered in the breeze and shook the sunlight from their leaves. +This alley, from the first day when the Princess came to lodge in the +house, had worn to Wogan a familiar air; and this morning, as he +pondered dismally whether, after all, those laborious months since he +had ridden hopefully out of Bologna to Ohlau were to bear no fruit, he +chanced to remember why. He had passed that alley at the moment of grey +dawn, when he was starting out upon this adventure, and he had seen a +man muffled in a cloak step from its mouth and suddenly draw back as his +horse's hoofs rang in the silent street, as though to elude recognition. +Wogan wondered for a second who at that time had lived in the house; but +he was admitted through a door in the wall and led into a little room +with French windows opening on a lawn. The garden seen from here was a +wealth of white blossoms and yellow, and amongst them Clementina paced +alone, the richest and the whitest blossom of them all. She was dressed +simply in a white gown of muslin and a little three-cornered hat of +straw; but Wogan knew as he advanced towards her that it was not merely +the hat which threw the dark shadow on her face. + +She took a step or two towards him and began at once without any +friendly greeting in a cold, formal voice,-- + +"You have received a letter this morning from his Majesty?" + +"Yes, your Highness." + +"Why does the King linger in Spain?" + +"The expedition from Cadiz--" + +"Which left harbour a week ago. Well, Mr. Wogan," she asked in biting +tones, "how does that expedition now on the high seas detain his Majesty +in Spain?" + +Wogan was utterly dumfounded. He stood and gazed at her, a great trouble +in his eyes, and his wits with that expedition all at sea. + +"Is your Highness sure?" he babbled. + +"Oh, indeed, most sure," she replied with the hardest laugh which he had +ever heard from a woman's lips. + +"I did not know," he said in dejection, and she took a step nearer to +him, and her cheeks flamed. + +"Is that the truth?" she asked, her voice trembling with anger. "You did +not know?" + +And Wogan understood that the real trouble with her at this moment was +not so much the King's delay in Spain as a doubt whether he himself had +played with her and spoken her false. For if he was proved untrue here, +why, he might have been untrue throughout, on the stairway at Innspruck, +on the road to Ala, in the hut on the bluff of the hills. He could see +how harshly the doubt would buffet her pride, how it would wound her to +the soul. + +"It is the truth," he answered; "you will believe it. I pledge my soul +upon it. Lay your hand in mine. I will repeat it standing so. Could I +speak false with your hand close in mine?" + +He held out his hand; she did not move, nor did her attitude of distrust +relent. + +"Could you not?" she asked icily. + +Wogan was baffled; he was angered. "Have I ever told you lies?" he asked +passionately, and she answered, "Yes," and steadily looked him in the +face. + +The monosyllable quenched him like a pail of cold water. He stood +silent, perplexed, trying to remember. + +"When?" he asked. + +"In the berlin between Brixen and Wellishmile." + +Wogan remembered that he had told her of his city of dreams. But it was +plainly not to that that she referred. He shrugged his shoulders. + +"I cannot remember." + +"You told me of an attack made upon a Scottish town, what time the King +was there in the year '15. He forced a passage through nine grenadiers +with loaded muskets and escaped over the roof-tops, where he played a +game of hide-and-seek among the chimneys. Ah, you remember the story +now. There was a chain, I remember, which even then as you told of it +puzzled me. He threw the chain over the head of one of those nine +grenadiers, and crossing his arms jerked it tight about the man's neck, +stifling his cry of warning. 'What chain?' I asked, and you +answered,--oh, sir, with a practised readiness,--'The chain he wore +about his neck.' Do you remember that? The chain linked your hand-locks, +Mr. Wogan. It was your own escape of which you told me. Why did you +ascribe your exploits to your King?" + +"Your Highness," he said, "we know the King, we who have served him day +in and day out for years. We can say freely to each other, 'The King's +achievements, they are to come.' We were in Scotland with him, and we +know they will not fail to come. But with you it's different. You did +not know him. You asked what he had done, and I told you. You asked for +more. You said, 'Amongst his throng of adventurers, each of whom has +something to his credit, what has he, the chief adventurer?'" + +"Well, sir, why not the truth in answer to the question?" + +"Because the truth's unfair to him." + +"And was the untruth fair to me?" + +Mr. Wogan was silent. + +"I think I understand," she continued bitterly; "you thought, here's a +foolish girl, aflame for knights and monsters overthrown. She cries for +deeds, not statecraft. Well, out of your many, you would toss her one, +and call it the King's. You could afford the loss, and she, please God, +would be content with it." She spoke with an extraordinary violence in a +low, trembling voice, and she would not listen to Wogan's stammered +interruption. + +"Very likely, too, the rest of your words to me was of a piece. I was a +girl, and girls are to have gallant speeches given to them like so many +lollipops. Oh, but you have hurt me beyond words. I would not have +thought I could have suffered so much pain!" + +That last cry wrung Wogan's heart. She turned away from him with the +tears brimming in her eyes. It was this conjecture of hers which he had +dreaded, which at all costs he must dispel. + +"Do not believe it!" he exclaimed. "Think! Should I have been at so much +pains to refrain from speech, if speech was what I had intended?" + +"How should I know but what that concealment was part of the gallantry, +a necessary preface to the pretty speeches?" + +"Should I have urged your rescue on the King had I believed you what you +will have it that I did,--a mere witless girl to be pampered with +follies?" + +"Then you admit," she cried, "you _urged_ the King." + +"Should I have travelled over Europe to search for a wife and lit on +you? Should I have ridden to Ohlau and pestered your father till he +yielded? Should I have ridden across Europe to Strasbourg? Should I have +endangered my friends in the rush to Innspruck? No, no, no! From first +to last you were the chosen woman." + +The vehemence and fire of sincerity with which he spoke had its effect +on her. She turned again towards him with a gleam of hopefulness in her +face, but midway in the turn she stopped. + +"You spoke to me words which I have not forgotten," she said doubtfully. +"You said the King had need of me. I will be frank, hoping that you will +match my frankness. On that morning when we climbed down the gorge, and +ever since I cheered myself with that one thought. The King had need of +me." + +"Never was truer word spoken," said Wogan, stoutly. + +"Then why is the King in Spain?" + +They had come back to the first question. Wogan had no new answer to it. +He said,-- + +"I do not know." + +For a moment or two Clementina searched his eyes. It seemed in the end +that she was satisfied he spoke the truth. For she said in a voice of +greater gentleness,-- + +"Then I will acquaint you. Will you walk with me for half a mile?" + +Wogan bowed, and followed her out of the garden. He could not think +whither she was leading him, or for what purpose. She walked without a +word to him, he followed without a question, and so pacing with much +dignity they came to the steps of a great house. Then Clementina halted. + +"Sir," said she, "can you put a name to the house?" + +"Upon my word, your Highness, I cannot." + +"It is the Caprara Palace," said she, suddenly, and suddenly she bent +her eyes upon Wogan. The name, however, conveyed no meaning whatever to +him, and his blank face told her so clearly. She nodded in a sort of +approval. "No," she said, relenting, "you did not know." + +She mounted the steps, and knocking upon the door was admitted by an old +broken serving-man, who told her that the Princess Caprara was away. It +was permitted him, however, to show the many curiosities and treasures +of the palace to such visitors as desired it. Clementina did desire it. +The old man led her and her companion to the armoury, where he was for +spending much time and breath over the trophies which the distinguished +General Caprara had of old rapt from the infidels. But Clementina +quickly broke in upon his garrulity. + +"I have a great wish to see the picture gallery," said she, and the old +man tottered onwards through many shrouded and darkened rooms. In the +picture gallery he drew up the blinds and then took a wand in his hand. + +"Will you show me first the portrait of Mlle. de Caprara?" said +Clementina. + +It was a full-length portrait painted with remarkable skill. Maria +Vittoria de Caprara was represented in a black dress, and the warm +Italian colouring of her face made a sort of glow in the dark picture. +Her eyes watched you from the canvas with so life-like a glance you had +a thought when you turned that they turned after you. Clementina gazed +at the picture for a long while, and the blood slowly mounted on her +neck and transfused her cheeks. + +"There is a face, Mr. Wogan,--a passionate, beautiful face,--which might +well set a seal upon a man's heart. I do not wonder. I can well believe +that though to-day that face gladdens the streets of Rome, a lover in +Spain might see it through all the thick earth of the Pyrenees. There, +sir, I promised to acquaint you why the King lingered in Spain. I have +fulfilled that promise;" and making a present to the custodian, she +walked back through the rooms and down the steps to the street. Wogan +followed her, and pacing with much dignity they walked back to the +little house among the trees, and so came again into the garden of +blossoms. + +The anger had now gone from her face, but it was replaced by a great +weariness. + +"It is strange, is it not," she said with a faltering smile, "that on a +spring morning, beneath this sky, amongst these flowers, I should think +with envy of the snows of Innspruck and my prison there? But I owe you a +reparation," she added. "You said the King had need of me. For that +saying of yours I find an apt simile. Call it a stone on which you bade +me set my foot and step. I stepped, and found that your stone was +straw." + +"No, madam," cried Wogan. + +"I had a thought," she continued, "you knew the stone was straw when +you commended it to me as stone. But this morning I have learned my +error. I acquit you, and ask your pardon. You did not know that the King +had no need of me." And she bowed to him as though the conversation was +at an end. Wogan, however, would not let her go. He placed himself in +front of her, engrossed in his one thought, "She must marry the King." +He spoke, however, none the less with sincerity when he cried,-- + +"Nor do I know now--no, and I shall not know." + +"You have walked with me to the Caprara Palace this morning. Or did I +dream we walked?" + +"What your Highness has shown me to-day I cannot gainsay. For this is +the first time that ever I heard of Mlle. de Caprara. But I am very sure +that you draw your inference amiss. You sit in judgment on the King, not +knowing him. You push aside the firm trust of us who know him as a thing +of no account. And because once, in a mood of remorse at my own +presumption, I ascribed one trivial exploit--at the best a success of +muscle and not brain--to the King which was not his, you strip him of +all merit on the instant." He saw that her face flushed. Here, at all +events, he had hit the mark, and he cried out with a ringing +confidence,-- + +"Your stone is stone, not straw." + +"Prove it me," said she. + +"What do you know of the Princess Caprara at the end of it all? You +have told me this morning all you know. I will go bail if the whole +truth were out the matter would take a very different complexion." + +Again she said,-- + +"Prove that to me!" and then she looked over his shoulder. Wogan turned +and saw that a servant was coming from the house across the lawn with a +letter on a salver. The Princess opened the letter and read it. Then she +turned again to Wogan. + +"His Eminence the Cardinal fixes the marriage in Bologna here for to-day +fortnight. You have thus two weeks wherein to make your word good." + +Two weeks, and Wogan had not an idea in his head as to how he was to set +about the business. But he bowed imperturbably. + +"Within two weeks I will convince your Highness," said he, and for a +good half-hour he sauntered with her about the garden before he took his +leave. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +But his thoughts had been busy during that half-hour, and as soon as he +had come out from the mouth of the alley, he ran to Gaydon's lodging. +Gaydon, however, was not in. O'Toole lodged in the same house, and Wogan +mounted to his apartments, hoping there to find news of Gaydon's +whereabouts. But O'Toole was taking the air, too, but Wogan found +O'Toole's servant. + +"Where will I find Captain O'Toole?" asked Wogan. + +"You will find his Excellency," said the servant, with a reproachful +emphasis upon the title, "at the little bookseller's in the Piazza." + +Wogan sprang down the stairs and hurried to the Piazza, wondering what +in the world O'Toole was doing at a bookseller's. O'Toole was bending +over the counter, which was spread with open books, and Wogan hailed him +from the doorway. O'Toole turned and blushed a deep crimson. He came to +the door as if to prevent Wogan's entrance into the shop. Wogan, +however, had but one thought in his head. + +"Where shall I find Gaydon?" he asked. + +"He went towards the Via San Vitale," replied O'Toole. + +Wogan set off again, and in an hour came upon Gaydon. He had lost an +hour of his fortnight; with the half-hour during which he had sauntered +in the garden, an hour and a half. + +"You went to Rome in the spring," said he. "There you saw the King. Did +you see anyone else by any chance whilst you were in Rome?" + +"Edgar," replied Gaydon, with a glance from the tail of his eye which +Wogan did not fail to remark. + +"Aha!" said he. "Edgar, to be sure, since you saw the King. But besides +Edgar, did you see anyone else?" + +"Whittington," said Gaydon. + +"Oho!" said Wogan, thoughtfully. "So you saw my friend Harry Whittington +at Rome. Did you see him with the King?" + +Gaydon was becoming manifestly uncomfortable. + +"He was waiting for the King," he replied. + +"Indeed. And whereabouts was he waiting for the King?" + +"Oh, outside a house in Rome," said Gaydon, as though he barely +remembered the incident. "It was no business of mine, that I could see." + +"None whatever, to be sure," answered Wogan, cordially. "But why in the +world should Whittington be waiting for the King outside a house in +Rome?" + +"It was night-time. He carried a lantern." + +"Of course, if it was night-time," exclaimed Wogan, in his most +unsuspicious accent, "and the King wished to pay a visit to a house in +Rome, he would take an attendant with a lantern. A servant, though, one +would have thought, unless, of course, it was a private sort of visit--" + +"It was no business of mine," Gaydon interrupted; "and so I made no +inquiries of Whittington." + +"But Whittington did not wait for inquiries, eh?" said Wogan, shrewdly. +"You are hiding something from me, my friend,--something which that good +honest simpleton of a Whittington blurted out to you without the least +thought of making any disclosure. Oh, I know my Whittington. And I know +you, too, Dick. I do not blame you. For when the King goes a-visiting +the Princess Caprara privately at night-time while the girl to whom he +is betrothed suffers in prison for her courageous loyalty to him, and +his best friends are risking their heads to set her free, why, there's +knowledge a man would be glad to keep even out of his own hearing. So +you see I know more than you credit me with. So tell me the rest! Don't +fob me off. Don't plead it is none of your business, for, upon my soul, +it is." Gaydon suddenly changed his manner. He spoke with no less +earnestness than Wogan,-- + +"You are in the right. It is my business, and why? Because it touches +you, Charles Wogan, and you are my friend." + +"Therefore you will tell me," cried Wogan. + +"Therefore I will not tell you," answered Gaydon. He had a very keen +recollection of certain pages of poetry he had seen on the table at +Schlestadt, of certain conversations in the berlin when he had feigned +to sleep. + +Wogan caught him by the arm. + +"I must know. Here have I lost two hours out of one poor fortnight. I +must know." + +"Why?" + +Gaydon stood quite unmoved, and with a remarkable sternness of +expression. Wogan understood that only the truth would unlock his lips, +and he cried,-- + +"Because unless I do, in a fortnight her Highness will refuse to marry +the King." And he recounted to him the walk he had taken and the +conversation he had held with Clementina that morning. Gaydon listened +with an unfeigned surprise. The story put Wogan in quite a different +light, and moreover it was told with so much sincerity of voice and so +clear a simplicity of language, Gaydon could not doubt one syllable. + +"I am afraid, my friend," said he, "my thoughts have done you some +wrong--" + +"Leave me out of them," cried Wogan, impatiently. He had no notion and +no desire to hear what Gaydon meant. "Tell me from first to last what +you saw in Rome." + +Gaydon told him thereupon of that secret passage from the Chevalier's +house into the back street, and of that promenade to the Princess's +house which he had spied upon. Wogan listened without any remark, and +yet without any attempt to quicken his informant. But as soon as he had +the story, he set off at a run towards the Cardinal's palace. "So the +Princess," he thought, "had more than a rumour to go upon, though how +she came by her knowledge the devil only knows." At the palace he was +told that the Cardinal was gone to the Archiginnasio. + +"I will wait," said Wogan; and he waited in the library for an +hour,--another priceless hour of that swiftly passing fortnight, and he +was not a whit nearer to his end! He made it his business, however, to +show a composed face to his Eminence, and since his Eminence's dinner +was ready, to make a pretence of sharing the meal. The Cardinal was in a +mood of great contentment. + +"It is your presence, Mr. Wogan, puts me in a good humour," he was +pleased to say. + +"Or a certain letter your Eminence received from Spain to-day?" asked +Wogan. + +"True, the letter was one to cause all the King's friends satisfaction." + +"And some few of them, perhaps, relief," said Wogan. + +The Cardinal glanced at Wogan, but with a quite impassive countenance. +He took a pinch of snuff and inhaled it delicately. Then he glanced at +Wogan again. + +"I have a hope, Mr. Wogan," said he, with a great cordiality. "You shall +tell me if it is to fall. I see much of you of late, and I have a hope +that you are thinking of the priesthood. We should welcome you very +gladly, you may be sure. Who knows but what there is a Cardinal's hat +hung up in the anteroom of the future for you to take down from its +peg?" + +The suggestion was sufficiently startling to Wogan, who had thought of +nothing less than of entering into orders. But he was not to be diverted +by this piece of ingenuity. + +"Your Eminence," said he, "although I hold myself unworthy of priestly +vows, I am here in truth in the character of a catechist." + +"Catechise, then, my friend," said the Cardinal, with a smile. + +"First, then, I would ask your Eminence how many of the King's followers +have had the honour of being presented to the Princess Clementina?" + +"Very few." + +"Might I know the names?" + +"To be sure." + +Cardinal Origo repeated three or four names. They were the names of men +known to Wogan for irreproachable loyalty. Not one of them would have +gone about the Princess with slanders upon his master; he would have +gone bail for them all,--at least, a month ago he would, he reflected, +though now indeed he hardly knew where to put his trust. + +"Her Highness lives, as you know, a very suitable, secluded life," +continued Origo. + +"But might not others have had access to her at the Pilgrim Inn?" + +"Nay, she was there but the one night,--the night of her arrival. I do +not think it likely. For if you remember, I myself went to her early the +next morning, and by a stroke of good luck I had already come upon the +little house in the garden which was offered to me by a friend of yours +for her Highness's service." + +"On the evening of our arrival? A friend of mine offered you the house," +said Wogan, puzzling over who that friend could be. + +"Yes. Harry Whittington." + +Wogan started to his feet. So, after all, Whittington was at the bottom +of the trouble. Wogan wondered whether he had done wisely not to publish +the fellow's treachery. But he could not,--no, he had to make his +account with the man alone. There were reasons. + +"It was Harry Whittington who offered the house for her Highness's use?" +Wogan exclaimed. + +"It was an offer most apt and kind." + +"And made on the evening of our arrival?" + +"Not an hour after you left me. But you are surprised?" + +Wogan was reflecting that on the evening of his arrival, and indeed just +before Whittington made his offer to Origo, he had seen Whittington's +face by the torchlight in the square. That face lived very plainly in +Wogan's thoughts. It was certainly not for Clementina's service that +Whittington had offered the house. Wogan resumed his seat, saying +carelessly,-- + +"I was surprised, for I had a notion that Whittington lodged opposite +the Torre Garisenda, and not at the house." + +"Nor did he. He hired it for a friend who has now left Bologna." + +"Man or woman?" asked Wogan, remembering that visitor who had drawn back +into the alley one early morning of last autumn. The man might very +likely have been Whittington. + +"I did not trouble to inquire," said the Cardinal. "But, Mr. Wogan, why +do you ask me these questions?" + +"I have not come yet to the end of them," answered Wogan. "There is one +more." + +"Ask it!" said his Eminence, crossing his legs. + +"Will your Eminence oblige me with a history of the affection of Maria +Vittoria, Mlle. de Caprara, for the King?" + +The Cardinal uncrossed his legs and bounced in his chair. + +"Here is a question indeed!" he stuttered. + +"And a history of the King's response to it," continued Wogan, +implacably, "with a particular account of why the King lingers in Spain +after the Cadiz expedition has put out to sea." + +Origo was now quite still. His face was pale, and he had lost in an +instant that air of affectation which so contrasted with his broad +features. + +"This is very dangerous talk," said he, solemnly. + +"Not so dangerous as silence." + +"Some foolish slanderer has been busy at your ears." + +"Not at my ears," returned Wogan. + +The Cardinal took his meaning. "Is it so, indeed?" said he, +thoughtfully, once or twice. Then he reached out his hand towards an +escritoire. "But here's the King's letter come this morning." + +"It is not enough," said Wogan, "for the King lingers in Spain, and the +portrait of Maria Vittoria glows on the walls of the Caprara Palace, +whither I was bidden to escort her Highness this morning." + +The Cardinal walked thoughtfully to and fro about the room, but made up +his mind in the end. + +"I will tell you the truth of the matter, Mr. Wogan. The King saw Mlle. +de Caprara for the first time while you were searching Europe for a wife +for him. He saw her here one morning at Mass in the Church of the +Crucifixion, and came away most silent. Of their acquaintance I need not +speak. The King just for one month became an ardent youth. He appealed +to the Pope for his consent to marry Mlle. de Caprara, and the Pope +consented. The King was just sending off a message to bid you cease your +search when you came back with the news that her Highness the Princess +Clementina had accepted the King's hand and would shortly set out for +Bologna. Sir, the King was in despair, though he showed to you a +smiling, grateful face. Mlle. de Caprara went to Rome; the King stayed +here awaiting his betrothed. There came the news of her imprisonment. +The King, after all, is a man. If his heart leaped a little at the news, +who shall blame him? Do you remember how you came privately one night +to the King's cabinet and found me there in the King's company?" + +"But," stammered Wogan, "I do remember that evening. I remember that the +King was pale, discouraged--" + +"And why?" said Origo. "Because her Highness's journey had been +interrupted, because the marriage now seemed impossible? No, but because +Mr. Charles Wogan was back in Bologna, because Mr. Charles Wogan had +sought for a private interview, because the King had no more doubt than +I as to what Mr. Charles Wogan intended to propose, and because the King +knew that what Mr. Wogan set his hand to was as good as done. You +remember I threw such hindrances as I could in your way, and made much +of the risks you must run, and the impossibility of your task. Now you +know why." + +Never was a man more confused than Wogan at this story of the +Cardinal's. "It makes me out a mere meddlesome fool," he cried, and sat +stunned. + +"It is an unprofitable question at this time of day," said the Cardinal, +with a smile. "Matters have gone so far that they can no longer be +remedied. This marriage must take place." + +"True," said Wogan. + +"The King, indeed, is firmly inclined to it." + +"Yet he lingers in Spain." + +"That I cannot explain to you, but he has been most loyal. That you must +take my word for, so must your Princess." + +"Yet this winter when I was at Schlestadt preparing the expedition to +Innspruck," Wogan said with a certain timidity, for he no longer felt +that it was within his right to make reproaches, "the King was in Rome +visiting Mlle. de Caprara." + +The Cardinal flushed with some anger at Wogan's persistence. + +"Come, sir," said he, "what has soured you with suspicions? Upon my +word, here is a man sitting with me who bears your name, but few of +those good qualities the name is linked with in my memories. Your King +saw Mlle. de Caprara once in Rome, once only. Major Gaydon had come at +your request to Rome to fetch a letter in the King's hand, bidding her +Highness entrust herself to you. Up to that moment the issue of your +exploit was in the balance. But your request was to the King a very +certain sign that you would indeed succeed. So the night before he wrote +the letter he went to the Caprara Palace and took his farewell of the +woman he loved. So much may be pardoned to any man, even by you, who, it +seems, stand pinnacled above these earthly affections." + +The blood rushed into Wogan's face at the sneer, but he bowed his head +to it, being much humbled by Origo's disclosures. + +"This story I have told you," continued the Cardinal, "I will make bold +to tell to-morrow to her Highness." + +"But you must also explain why the King lingers in Spain," Wogan +objected. "I am very certain of it. The Princess has her pride; she +will not marry a reluctant man." + +"Well, that I cannot do," cried the Cardinal, now fairly exasperated. +"Pride! She has her pride! Is it to ruin a cause, this pride of hers? Is +it to wreck a policy?" + +"No," cried Wogan, starting up. "I have a fortnight. I beg your Eminence +not to speak one word to her Highness until this fortnight is gone, +until the eve of the marriage in Bologna. Give me till then. I have a +hope there will be no need for us to speak at all." + +The Cardinal shrugged his shoulders. + +"You must do more than hope. Will you pledge your word to it?" + +Here it seemed to Wogan was an occasion when a man must dare. + +"Yes," he said, and so went out of the house. He had spoken under a +sudden inspiration; the Cardinal's words had shown him a way which with +careful treading might lead to his desired result. He went first to his +lodging, and ordered his servant Marnier to saddle his black horse. Then +he hurried again to O'Toole's lodging, and found his friend back from +the bookseller's indeed, but breathing very hard of a book which he slid +behind his back. + +"I am to go on a journey," said Wogan, "and there's a delicate sort of +work I would trust to you." + +O'Toole looked distantly at Wogan. + +"_Opus_," said he, in a far-away voice. + +"I want you to keep an eye on the little house in the garden--" + +O'Toole nodded. "_Hortus, hortus, hortum_," said he, "_horti--hortus_," +and he fingered the book at his back, "no, _horti, horto, horto_. Do you +know, my friend, that the difference between the second and fourth +declensions was solely invented by the grammarians for their own profit. +It is of no manner of use, and the most plaguy business that ever I +heard of." + +"O'Toole," cried Wogan, with a bang of his fist, "you are no more +listening to me than this table." + +At once O'Toole's face brightened, and with a shout of pride he reeled +out, "_Mensa, mensa, mensam, mensae, mensae, mensa_." Wogan sprang up in +a rage. + +"Don't _mensa, mensam_ me when I am talking most seriously to you! What +is it you are after? What's that book you are hiding? Let me look at +it!" O'Toole blushed on every visible inch of him and handed the book to +Wogan. + +"It's a Latin grammar, my friend," said he, meekly. + +"And what in the world do you want to be addling your brains with a +Latin grammar for, when there's other need for your eyes?" + +"Aren't we to be enrolled at the Capitol in June as Roman Senators with +all the ancient honours, _cum titubis_--it is so--_cum titubis_, which +are psalters or pshawms?" + +"Well, what then?" + +"You don't understand, Charles, the difficulty of my position. You have +Latin at your finger-ends. Sure, I have often admired you for your +extraordinary comprehension of Latin, but never more than I do now. It +will be no trouble in the world for you to trip off a neat little +speech, thanking the Senators kindly for the great honour they are doing +themselves in electing us into their noble body. But it will not be easy +for me," said O'Toole, with a sigh. "How can I get enough Latin through +my skull by June not to disgrace myself?" He looked so utterly miserable +and distressed that Wogan never felt less inclined to laugh. "I sit up +at nights with a lamp, but the most unaccountable thing happens. I may +come in here as lively as any cricket, but the moment I take this book +in my hands I am overpowered with sleep--" + +"Oh, listen to me," cried Wogan. "I have only a fortnight--" + +"And I have only till June," sighed O'Toole. "But there! I am listening. +I have no doubt, my friend, your business is more important than mine," +he said with the simplicity of which not one of his friends could resist +the appeal. Wogan could not now. + +"My business," he said, "is only more important because you have no need +of your Latin grammar at all. There's a special deputy, a learned +professor, appointed on these occasions to make a speech for us, and all +we have to do is to sit still and nod our heads wisely when he looks +towards us." + +"Is that all?" cried O'Toole, jumping up. "Swear it!" + +"I do," said Wogan; and "Here's to the devil with the Latin grammar!" +exclaimed O'Toole. He flung open his window and hurled the book out +across the street with the full force of his prodigious arm. There +followed a crash and then the tinkle of falling glass. O'Toole beamed +contentedly and shut the window. + +"Now what will I do for you in return for this?" he asked. + +"Keep a watch on the little house and the garden. I will tell you why +when I return. Observe who goes in to visit the Princess, but hinder no +one. Only remember who they are and let me know." And Wogan got back to +his lodging and mounted his black horse. He could trust O'Toole to play +watchdog in his absence. If the mysterious visitor who had bestowed upon +Clementina with so liberal a hand so much innuendo and such an artful +combination of truth and falsity, were to come again to the little house +to confirm the slanders, Wogan in the end would not fail to discover the +visitor's identity. + +He dismissed the matter from his mind and rode out from Bologna. Four +days afterwards he presented himself at the door of the Caprara Palace. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + + +Maria Vittoria received the name of her visitor with a profound +astonishment. Then she stamped her foot and said violently, "Send him +away! I hate him." But curiosity got the better of her hate. She felt a +strong desire to see the meddlesome man who had thrust himself between +her and her lover; and before her woman had got so far as the door, she +said, "Let him up to me!" She was again surprised when Wogan was +admitted, for she expected a stout and burly soldier, stupid and +confident, of the type which blunders into success through sheer +ignorance of the probabilities of defeat. Mr. Wogan, for his part, saw +the glowing original of the picture at Bologna, but armed at all points +with hostility. + +"Your business," said she, curtly. Wogan no less curtly replied that he +had a wish to escort Mlle. de Caprara to Bologna. He spoke as though he +was suggesting a walk on the Campagna. + +"And why should I travel to Bologna?" she asked. Wogan explained. The +explanation required delicacy, but he put it in as few words as might +be. There were slanderers at work. Her Highness the Princess Clementina +was in great distress; a word from Mlle. de Caprara would make all +clear. + +"Why should I trouble because the Princess Clementina has a crumpled +rose-leaf in her bed? I will not go," said Mlle. de Caprara. + +"Yet her Highness may justly ask why the King lingers in Spain." Wogan +saw a look, a smile of triumph, brighten for an instant on the angry +face. + +"It is no doubt a humiliation to the Princess Clementina," said Maria +Vittoria, with a great deal of satisfaction. "But she must learn to bear +humiliation like other women." + +"But she will reject the marriage," urged Wogan. + +"The fool!" cried Maria Vittoria, and she laughed almost gaily. "I will +not budge an inch to persuade her to it. Let her fancy what she will and +weep over it! I hate her; therefore she is out of my thought." + +Wogan was not blind to the inspiriting effect of his argument upon Maria +Vittoria. He had, however, foreseen it, and he continued +imperturbably,-- + +"No doubt you think me something of a fool, too, to advance so unlikely +a plea. But if her Highness rejects the marriage, who suffers? Her +Highness's name is already widely praised for her endurance, her +constancy. If, after all, at the last moment she scornfully rejects that +for which she has so stoutly ventured, whose name, whose cause, will +suffer most? It will be one more misfortune, one more disaster, to add +to the crushing weight under which the King labours. There will be +ignominy; who will be dwarfed by it? There will be laughter; whom will +it souse? There will be scandal; who will be splashed by it? The +Princess or the King?" + +Maria Vittoria stood with her brows drawn together in a frown. "I will +not go," she said after a pause. "Never was there so presumptuous a +request. No, I will not." + +Wogan made his bow and retired. But he was at the Caprara Palace again +in the morning, and again he was admitted. He noticed without regret +that Maria Vittoria bore the traces of a restless night. + +"What should I say if I went with you?" she asked. + +"You would say why the King lingers in Spain." + +Maria Vittoria gave a startled look at Wogan. + +"Do you know why?" + +"You told me yesterday." + +"Not in words." + +"There are other ways of speech." + +That one smile of triumph had assured Wogan that the King's delay was +her doing and a condition of their parting. + +"How will my story, though I told it, help?" asked Mlle. de Caprara. +Wogan had no doubts upon that score. The story of the Chevalier and +Maria Vittoria had a strong parallel in Clementina's own history. +Circumstance and duty held them apart, as it held apart Clementina and +Wogan himself. In hearing Maria Vittoria's story, Clementina would hear +her own; she must be moved to sympathy with it; she would regard with +her own generous eyes those who played unhappy parts in its +development; she could have no word of censure, no opportunity for +scorn. + +"Tell the story," said Wogan. "I will warrant the result." + +"No, I will not go," said she; and again Wogan left the house. And again +he came the next morning. + +"Why should I go?" said Maria Vittoria, rebelliously. "Say what you have +said to me to her! Speak to her of the ignominy which will befall the +King! Tell her how his cause will totter! Why talk of this to me? If she +loves the King, your words will persuade her. For on my life they have +nearly persuaded me." + +"If she loves the King!" said Wogan, quietly, and Maria Vittoria stared +at him. There was something she had not conjectured before. + +"Oh, she does not love him!" she said in wonderment. Her wonderment +swiftly changed to contempt. "The fool! Let her go on her knees and pray +for a modest heart. There's my message to her. Who is she that she +should not love him?" But it nevertheless altered a trifle pleasurably +Maria Vittoria's view of the position. It was pain to her to contemplate +the Chevalier's marriage, a deep, gnawing, rancorous pain, but the pain +was less, once she could believe he was to marry a woman who did not +love him. She despised the woman for her stupidity; none the less, that +was the wife she would choose, if she must needs choose another than +herself. "I have a mind to see this fool-woman of yours," she said +doubtfully. "Why does she not love the King?" + +Wogan could have answered that she had never seen him. He thought +silence, however, was the more expressive. The silence led Maria +Vittoria to conjecture. + +"Is there another picture at her heart?" she asked, and again Wogan was +silent. "Whose, then? You will not tell me." + +It might have been something in Wogan's attitude or face which revealed +the truth to her; it might have been her recollection of what the King +had said concerning Wogan's enthusiasm; it might have been merely her +woman's instinct. But she started and took a step towards Wogan. Her +eyes certainly softened. "I will go with you to Bologna," she said; and +that afternoon with the smallest equipment she started from Rome. Wogan +had ridden alone from Bologna to Rome in four days; he had spent three +days in Rome; he now took six days to return in company with Mlle. de +Caprara and her few servants. He thus arrived in Bologna on the eve of +that day when he was to act as the King's proxy in the marriage. + +It was about four o'clock in the afternoon when the tiny cavalcade +clattered through the Porta Castiglione. Wogan led the way to the +Pilgrim Inn, where he left Maria Vittoria, saying that he would return +at nightfall. He then went on foot to O'Toole's lodging. O'Toole, +however, had no news for him. + +"There has been no mysterious visitor," said he. + +"There will be one to-night," answered Wogan. "I shall need you." + +"I am ready," said O'Toole. + +The two friends walked back to the Pilgrim Inn. They were joined by +Maria Vittoria, and they then proceeded to the little house among the +trees. Outside the door in the garden wall Wogan posted O'Toole. + +"Let no one pass," said he, "till we return." + +He knocked on the door, and after a little delay--for the night had +fallen, and there was no longer a porter at the gate--a little hatch was +opened, and a servant inquired his business. + +"I come with a message of the utmost importance," said Wogan. "I beg you +to inform her Highness that the Chevalier Wogan prays for two words with +her." + +The hatch was closed, and the servant's footsteps were heard to retreat. +Wogan's anxieties had been increasing with every mile of that homeward +journey. On his ride to Rome he had been sensible of but one +obstacle,--the difficulty of persuading the real Vittoria to return with +him. But once that had been removed, others sprang to view, and each +hour enlarged them. There was but this one night, this one interview! +Upon the upshot of it depended whether a woman, destined by nature for a +queen, should set her foot upon the throne-steps, whether a cause should +suffer its worst of many eclipses, whether Europe should laugh or +applaud. These five minutes while he waited outside the door threw him +into a fever. "You will be friendly," he implored Mlle. de Caprara. "Oh, +you cannot but be! She must marry the King. I plead for him, not the +least bit in the world for her. For his sake she must complete the work +she has begun. She is not obstinate; she has her pride as a woman +should. You will tell her just the truth,--of the King's loyalty and +yours. Hearts cannot be commanded. Alas, mademoiselle, it is a hard +world at the end of it. It is mortised with the blood of broken hearts. +But duty, mademoiselle, duty, a consciousness of rectitude,--these are +very noble qualities. It will be a high consolation, mademoiselle, one +of these days, when the King sits upon his throne in England, to think +that your self-sacrifice had set him there." And Mr. Wogan hopped like a +bear on hot bricks, twittering irreproachable sentiments until the +garden door was opened. + +Beyond the door stretched a level space of grass intersected by a gravel +path. Along this path the servant led Wogan and his companion into the +house. There were lights in the windows on the upper floor, and a small +lamp illuminated the hall. But the lower rooms were dark. The servant +mounted the stairs, and opening the door of a little library, announced +the Chevalier Wogan. Wogan led his companion in by the hand. + +"Your Highness," said he, "I have the honour to present to you the +Princess Maria Vittoria Caprara." He left the two women standing +opposite to and measuring each other silently; he closed the door and +went down stairs into the hall. A door in the hall opened on to a small +parlour, with windows giving on to the garden. There once before Lady +Featherstone and Harry Whittington had spoken of Wogan's love for the +Princess Clementina and speculated upon its consequences. Now Wogan sat +there alone in the dark, listening to the women's voices overhead. He +had come to the end of his efforts and could only wait. At all events, +the women were talking, that was something; if he could only hear them +weeping! The sound of tears would have been very comforting to Wogan at +that moment, but he only heard the low voices talking, talking. He +assured himself over and over again that this meeting could not fail of +its due result. That Maria Vittoria had exacted some promise which held +his King in Spain he was now aware. She would say what that promise was, +the condition of their parting. She had come prepared to say it--and the +thread of Wogan's reasonings was abruptly cut. It seemed to him that he +heard something more than the night breeze through the trees,--a sound +of feet upon the gravel path, a whispering of voices. + +The windows were closed, but not shuttered. Wogan pressed his eyes to +the pane and looked out. The night was dark, and the sky overclouded. +But he had been sitting for some minutes in the darkness, and his eyes +were able to prove that his ears had not deceived him. For he saw the +dim figures of two men standing on the lawn before the window. They +appeared to be looking at the lighted windows on the upper floor, then +one of them waved to his companion to stand still, and himself walked +towards the door. Wogan noticed that he made no attempt at secrecy; he +walked with a firm tread, careless whether he set his foot on gravel or +on grass. As this man approached the door, Wogan slipped into the hall +and opened it. But he blocked the doorway, wondering whether these men +had climbed the wall or whether O'Toole had deserted his post. + +O'Toole had not deserted his post, but he had none the less admitted +these two men. For Wogan and Maria Vittoria had barely been ten minutes +within the house when O'Toole heard the sound of horses' hoofs in the +entrance of the alley. They stopped just within the entrance. O'Toole +distinguished three horses, he saw the three riders dismount; and while +one of the three held the horses, the other two walked on foot towards +the postern-door. + +O'Toole eased his sword in its scabbard. + +"The little fellows thought to catch Charles Wogan napping," he said to +himself with a smile, and he let them come quite close to him. He was +standing motionless in the embrasure of the door, nor did he move when +the two men stopped and whispered together, nor when they advanced +again, one behind the other. But he remarked that they held their cloaks +to their faces. At last they came to a halt just in front of O'Toole. +The leader produced a key. + +"You stand in my way, my friend," said he, pleasantly, and he pushed by +O'Toole to the lock of the door. O'Toole put out a hand, caught him by +the shoulder, and sent him spinning into the road. The man came back, +however, and though out of breath, spoke no less pleasantly than before. + +"I wish to enter," said he. "I have important business." + +O'Toole bowed with the utmost dignity. + +"_Romanus civis sum_," said he. "_Sum_ senator too. _Dic Latinam +linguam, amicus meus_." + +O'Toole drew a breath; he could not but feel that he had acquitted +himself with credit. He half began to regret that there was to be a +learned professor to act as proxy on that famous day at the Capitol. His +antagonist drew back a little and spoke no longer pleasantly. + +"Here's tomfoolery that would be as seasonable at a funeral," said he, +and he advanced again, still hiding his face. "Sir, you are blocking my +way. I have authority to pass through that door in the wall." + +"_Murus?_" asked O'Toole. He shook his head in refusal. + +"And by what right do you refuse me?" + +O'Toole had an inspiration. He swept his arm proudly round and gave the +reason of his refusal. + +"_Balbus aedificabat murum_," said he; and a voice that made O'Toole +start cried, "Enough of this! Stand aside, whoever you may be." + +It was the second of the two men who spoke, and he dropped the cloak +from his face. "The King!" exclaimed O'Toole, and he stood aside. The +two men passed into the garden, and Wogan saw them from the window. + +Just as O'Toole had blocked the King's entrance into the garden, so did +Wogan bar his way into the house. + +"Who, in Heaven's name, are you?" cried the Chevalier. + +"Nay, there's a question for me to ask," said Wogan. + +"Wogan!" cried the Chevalier, and "The King!" cried Wogan in one breath. + +Wogan fell back; the Chevalier pushed into the hall and turned. + +"So it is true. I could not, did not, believe it. I came from Spain to +prove it false. I find it true," he said in a low voice. "You whom I so +trusted! God help me, where shall I look for honour?" + +"Here, your Majesty," answered Wogan, without an instant's +hesitation,--"here, in this hall. There, in the rooms above." + +He had seized the truth in the same second when he recognised his King, +and the King's first words had left him in no doubt. He knew now why he +had never found Harry Whittington in any corner of Bologna. Harry +Whittington had been riding to Spain. + +The Chevalier laughed harshly. + +"Sir, I suspect honour which needs such barriers to protect it. You are +here, in this house, at this hour, with a sentinel to forbid intrusion +at the garden door. Explain me this honourably." + +"I had the honour to escort a visitor to her Highness, and I wait until +the visit is at an end." + +"What? Can you not better that excuse?" said the Chevalier. "A visitor! +We will make acquaintance, Mr. Wogan, with your visitor, unless you have +another sentinel to bar my way;" and he put his foot upon the step of +the stairs. + +"I beg your Majesty to pause," said Wogan, firmly. "Your thoughts wrong +me, and not only me." + +"Prove me that!" + +"I say boldly, 'Here is a servant who loves his Queen!' What then?" + +"This! That you should say, 'Here is a man who loves a woman,--loves her +so well he gives his friends the slip, and with the woman comes alone to +Peri.'" + +"Ah. To Peri! So I thought," began Wogan, and the Chevalier whispered,-- + +"Silence! You raise your voice too high. You no doubt are anxious in +your great respect that there should be some intimation of my coming. +But I dispense with ceremony. I will meet this fine visitor of yours at +once;" and he ran lightly up the stairs. + +Then Wogan did a bold thing. He followed, he sprang past the King, he +turned at the stair-top and barred the way. + +"Sir, I beg you to listen to me," he said quietly. + +"Beg!" said the Chevalier, leaning back against the wall with his dark +eyes blazing from a white face; "you insist." + +"Your Majesty will yet thank me for my insistence." He drew a +pocket-book out of his coat. "At Peri in Italy we were attacked by five +soldiers sent over the border by the Governor of Trent. Who guided those +five soldiers? Your Majesty's confidant and friend, who is now, I thank +God, waiting in the garden. Here is the written confession of the leader +of the five. I pray your Majesty to read it." + +Wogan held out the paper. The Chevalier hesitated and took it. Then he +read it once and glanced at it again. He passed his hand over his +forehead. + +"Whom shall I trust?" said he, in a voice of weariness. + +"What honest errand was taking Whittington to Peri?" asked Wogan, and +again the Chevalier read a piece here and there of the confession. Wogan +pressed his advantage. "Whittington is not the only one of Walpole's men +who has hoodwinked us the while he filled his pockets. There are others, +one, at all events, who did not need to travel to Spain for an ear to +poison;" and he leaned forward towards the Chevalier. + +"What do you mean?" asked the Chevalier, in a startled voice. + +"Why, sir, that the same sort of venomous story breathed to you in Spain +has been spoken here in Bologna, only with altered names. I told your +Majesty I brought a visitor to this house to-night. I did; there was no +need I should, since the marriage is fixed for to-morrow. I brought her +all the way from Rome." + +"From Rome?" exclaimed the Chevalier. + +"Yes;" and Wogan flung open the door of the library, and drawing himself +up announced in his loudest voice, "The King!" + +A loud cry came through the opening. It was not Clementina's voice which +uttered it. The Chevalier recognised the cry. He stood for a moment or +two looking at Wogan. Then he stepped over the threshold, and Wogan +closed the door behind him. But as he closed it he heard Maria Vittoria +speak. She said,-- + +"Your Majesty, a long while ago, when you bade me farewell, I demanded +of you a promise, which I have but this moment explained to the +Princess, who now deigns to call me friend. Your Majesty has broken the +promise. I had no right to demand it. I am very glad." + +Wogan went downstairs. He could leave the three of them shut up in that +room to come by a fitting understanding. Besides, there was other work +for him below,--work of a simple kind, to which he had now for some +weeks looked forward. He crept down the stairs very stealthily. The hall +door was still open. He could see dimly the figure of a man standing on +the grass. + + * * * * * + +When the Chevalier came down into the garden an hour afterwards, a man +was still standing on the grass. The man advanced to him. "Who is it?" +asked the Chevalier, drawing back. The voice which answered him was +Wogan's. + +"And Whittington?" + +"He has gone," replied Wogan. + +"You have sent him away?" + +"I took so much upon myself." + +The Chevalier held out his hand to Wogan. "I have good reason to thank +you," said he, and before he could say another word, a door shut above, +and Maria Vittoria came down the stairs towards them. O'Toole was still +standing sentry at the postern-door, and the three men escorted the +Princess Caprara to the Pilgrim Inn. She had spoken no word during the +walk, but as she turned in the doorway of the inn, the light struck upon +her face and showed that her eyes glistened. To the Chevalier she said, +"I wish you, my lord, all happiness, and the boon of a great love. With +all my heart I wish it;" and as he bowed over her hand, she looked +across his shoulder to Wogan. + +"I will bid you farewell to-morrow," she said with a smile, and the +Chevalier explained her saying afterwards as they accompanied him to his +lodging. + +"Mlle. de Caprara will honour us with her presence to-morrow. You will +still act as my proxy, Wogan. I am not yet returned from Spain. I wish +no questions or talk about this evening's doings. Your friend will +remember that?" + +"My friend, sir," said Wogan, "who was with me at Innspruck, is Captain +Lucius O'Toole of Dillon's regiment." + +"_Et_ senator too," said the Chevalier, with a laugh; and he added a +friendly word or two which sent O'Toole back to his lodging in a high +pleasure. Wogan walked thither with him and held out his hand at the +door. + +"But you will come up with me," said O'Toole. "We will drink a glass +together, for God knows when we speak together again. I go back to +Schlestadt to-morrow." + +"Ah, you go back," said Wogan; and he came in at the door and mounted +the stairs. At the first landing he stopped. + +"Let me rouse Gaydon." + +"Gaydon went three days ago." + +"Ah! And Misset is with his wife. Here are we all once more scattered, +and, as you say, God knows when we shall speak together again;" and he +went on to the upper storey. + +O'Toole remarked that he dragged in his walk and that his voice had a +strange, sad note of melancholy. + +"My friend," said he, "you have the black fit upon you; you are plainly +discouraged. Yet to-night sees the labour of many months brought to its +due close;" and as he lit the candles on his chimney, he was quite +amazed by the white, tired face which the light showed to him. Wogan, +indeed, harassed by misgivings, and worn with many vigils, presented a +sufficiently woe-begone picture. The effect was heightened by the +disorder of his clothes, which were all daubed with clay in a manner +quite surprising to O'Toole, who knew the ground to be dry underfoot. + +"True," answered Wogan, "the work ends to-night. Months ago I rode down +this street in the early morning, and with what high hopes! The work +ends to-night, and may God forgive me for a meddlesome fellow. Cup and +ball's a fine game, but it is ill playing it with women's hearts;" and +he broke off suddenly. "I'll give you a toast, Lucius! Here's to the +Princess Clementina!" and draining his glass he stood for a while, lost +in the recollecting of that flight from Innspruck; he was far away from +Bologna thundering down the Brenner through the night, with the sparks +striking from the wheels of the berlin, and all about him a glimmering, +shapeless waste of snow. + +"To the Princess--no, to the Queen she was born to be," cried O'Toole, +and Wogan sprang at him. + +"You saw that," he exclaimed, his eyes lighting, his face transfigured +in the intensity of this moment's relief. "Aye,--to love a nation,--that +is her high destiny. For others, a husband, a man; for her, a nation. +And you saw it! It is evident, to be sure. Yet this or that thing she +did, this or that word she spoke, assured you, eh? Tell me what proved +to you here was no mere woman, but a queen!" + +The morning had dawned before Wogan had had his fill. O'Toole was very +well content to see his friend's face once more quivering like a boy's +with pleasure, to hear him laugh, to watch the despondency vanish from +his aspect. "There's another piece of good news," he said at the end, +"which I had almost forgotten to tell you. Jenny and the Princess's +mother are happily set free. It seems Jenny swore from daybreak to +daybreak, and the Pope used his kindliest offices, and for those two +reasons the Emperor was glad to let them go. But there's a question I +would like to ask you. One little matter puzzles me." + +"Ask your question," said Wogan. + +"To-night through that door in the garden wall which I guarded, there +went in yourself and a lady,--the King and a companion he had with +him,--four people. Out of that door there came yourself, the lady, and +the King,--three people." + +"Ah," said Wogan, as he stood up with a strange smile upon his lips, "I +have a deal of clay upon my clothes." + +O'Toole nodded his head wisely once or twice. "I am answered," he said. +"Is it indeed so?" He understood, however, nothing except that the room +had suddenly grown cold. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + + +An account remains of the marriage ceremony, which took place the next +morning in Cardinal Origo's house. It was of the simplest kind and was +witnessed by few. Murray, Misset and his wife, and Maria Vittoria de +Caprara made the public part of the company; Wogan stood for the King; +and the Marquis of Monti Boulorois for James Sobieski, the bride's +father. Bride and bridegroom played their parts bravely and well, one +must believe, for the chronicler speaks of their grace and modesty of +bearing. Clementina rose at five in the morning, dressed in a robe of +white, tied a white ribbon about her hair, and for her only ornament +fixed a white collar of pearls about her neck. In this garb she went at +once to the church of San Domenico, where she made her confession, and +from the church to the Cardinal's Palace. There the Cardinal, with one +Maas, an English priest from Rome, at his elbow, was already waiting for +her. Mr. Wogan thereupon read the procuration, for which he had ridden +to Rome in haste so many months before, and pronounced the consent of +the King his master to its terms. Origo asked the Princess whether she +likewise consented, and the manner in which she spoke her one word, +"Yes," seems to have stirred the historian to paeans. It seems that all +the virtues launched that one little word, and were clearly expressed in +it. The graces, too, for once in a way went hand in hand with the +virtues. Never was a "Yes" so sweetly spoken since the earth rose out of +the sea. In a word, there was no ruffle of the great passion which these +two, man and woman, had trodden beneath their feet. She did not hint of +Iphigenia; he borrowed no plumes from Don Quixote. Nor need one fancy +that their contentment was all counterfeit. They were neither of them +grumblers, and "fate" and "destiny" were words seldom upon their lips. + +One incident, indeed, is related which the chronicler thought to be +curious, though he did not comprehend it. The Princess Clementina +brought from her confessional box a wisp of straw which clung to her +dress at the knee. Until Wogan had placed the King's ring upon her +finger, she did not apparently remark it; but no sooner had that office +been performed than she stooped, and with a friendly smile at her +makeshift bridegroom, she plucked it from her skirt and let it fall +beneath her foot. + +And that was all. No words passed between them after the ceremony, for +her Royal Highness went straight back to the little house in the garden, +and that same forenoon set out for Rome. + +She was not the only witness of the ceremony to take that road that day. +For some three hours later, to be precise, at half-past two, Maria +Vittoria stepped into her coach before the Pilgrim Inn. Wogan held the +carriage door open for her. He was still in the bravery of his wedding +clothes, and Maria Vittoria looked him over whimsically from the top of +his peruke to his shoe-buckles. + +"I came to see a fool-woman," said she, "and I saw a fool-man. Well, +well!" and she suddenly lowered her voice to a passionate whisper. "Why, +oh, why did you not take your fortunes in your hands at Peri?" + +Wogan leaned forward to her. "Do you know so much?" + +She answered him quickly. "I will never forgive you. Yes, I know." She +forced her lips into a smile. "I suppose you are content. You have your +black horse." + +"You know of the horse, too," said Wogan, colouring to the edge of his +peruke. "You know I have no further use for it." + +"Say that again, and I will beg it of you." + +"Nay, it is yours, then. I will send him after you to Rome." + +"Will you?" said Maria Vittoria. "Why, then, I accept. There's my +hand;" and she thrust it through the window to him. "If ever you come to +Rome, the Caprara Palace stands where it did at your last visit. I do +not say you will be welcome. No, I do not forgive you, but you may come. +Having your horse, I could hardly bar the door against you. So you may +come." + +Wogan raised her hand to his lips. + +"Aye," said she, with a touch of bitterness, "kiss my hand. You have had +your way. Here are two people crossmated, and two others not mated at +all. You have made four people entirely unhappy, and a kiss on the glove +sets all right." + +"Nay, not four," protested Wogan. + +"Your manners," she continued remorselessly, ticking off the names upon +her fingers, "will hinder you from telling me to my face the King is +happy. And the Princess?" + +"She was born to be a queen," replied Wogan, stubbornly. "Happiness, +mademoiselle! It does not come by the striving after it. That's the +royal road to miss it. You may build up your house of happiness with all +your care through years, and you will find you have only built it up to +draw down the blinds and hang out the hatchment above the door, for the +tenant to inhabit it is dead." + +Maria Vittoria listened very seriously till he came to the end. Then she +made a pouting grimace. "That is very fine, moral, and poetical. Your +Princess was born to be a queen. But what if her throne is set up only +in your city of dreams? Well, it is some consolation to know that you +are one of the four." + +"Nay, I will make a shift not to plague myself upon the way the world +treats you." + +"Ah, but because it treats you well," cried she. "There will be work for +you, hurryings to and fro, the opportunities of excelling, nights in the +saddle, and perhaps again the quick red life of battlefields. It is well +with you, but what of me, Mr. Wogan? What of me?" and she leaned back in +her carriage and drove away. Wogan had no answer to that despairing +question. He stood with his head bared till the carriage passed round a +corner and disappeared, but the voice rang for a long while in his ears. +And for a long while the dark eyes abrim with tears, and the tortured +face, kept him company at nights. He walked slowly back to his lodging, +and mounting a horse rode out of Bologna, and towards the Apennines. + +On one of the lower slopes he came upon a villa just beyond a curve of +the road, and reined in his horse. The villa nestled on the hillside +below him in a terraced garden of oleander and magnolias, very pretty to +the eye. Cypress hedges enclosed it; the spring had made it a bower of +rose blossoms, and depths of shade out of whose green darkness glowed +here and there a red statue like a tutelary god. Wogan dismounted and +led his horse down the path to the door. He inquired for Lady +Featherstone, and was shown into a room from the windows of which he +looked down on Bologna, that city of colonnades. Lady Featherstone, +however, had heard the tramp of his horse; she came running up from the +garden, and without waiting to hear any particulars of her visitor, +burst eagerly into the room. + +"Well?" she said, and stopped and swayed upon the threshold. Wogan +turned from the window towards her. + +"Your Ladyship was wise, I think, to leave Bologna. The little house in +the trees there had no such wide prospect as this." + +He spoke rather to give her time than out of any sarcasm. She set a +hand against the jamb of the door, and even so barely sustained her +trifling weight. Her knees shook, her childlike face grew white as +paper, a great terror glittered in her eyes. + +"I am not the visitor whom you expect," continued Wogan, "nor do I bring +the news which you would wish to hear;" and at that she raised a +trembling hand. "I beg you--a moment's silence. Then I will hear you, +Mr. Warner." She made a sort of stumbling run and reached a couch. Wogan +shut the door and waited. He was glad that she had used the name of +Warner. It recalled to him that evening at Ohlau when she had stood +behind the curtain with a stiletto in her hand, and the three last days +of his perilous ride to Schlestadt. He needed his most vivid +recollections to steel his heart against her; for he was beginning to +think it was his weary lot to go up and down the world causing pain to +women. After a while she said, "Now your news;" and she held her hand +lightly to her heart to await the blow. + +"The King married this morning the Princess Clementina," said Wogan. +Lady Featherstone did not move her hand; she still waited. It was just +to hinder this marriage that she had come to Italy, but her failure was +at this moment of no account. She heard of it with indifference; it had +no meaning to her. She waited. Wogan's mere presence at the villa told +her there was more to come. He continued:-- + +"Last night Mr. Whittington came with the King to Bologna--you +understand, no doubt, why;" and she nodded without moving her eyes from +his face. She made no pretence as to the part she had played in the +affair. All the world might know it. That was a matter at this moment of +complete indifference. She waited. + +"The King and Mr. Whittington came at nine of the night to the little +house which you once occupied. I was there, but I was not there alone. +Can your Ladyship conjecture whom I brought there? Your Ladyship, as I +learned last night from Mr. Whittington's own lips, had paid a visit +secretly, using a key which you had retained to the house on an excuse +that you had left behind jewels of some value. You saw her Highness the +Princess. You told her a story of the King and Mlle. de Caprara. I rode +to Rome, and when the King came last night Mlle. de Caprara was with the +Princess. I had evidence against Mr. Whittington, a confession of one of +the soldiers of the Governor of Trent, the leader of a party of five who +attacked me at Peri. No doubt you know of that little matter too;" and +again Lady Featherstone nodded. + +"Thus your double plot--to set the King against the Princess, and the +Princess against the King--doubly failed." + +"Go on," said Lady Featherstone, moistening her dry lips. Wogan told her +how from the little sitting-room on the ground-floor he had seen the +King and Whittington cross the lawn; he described his interview with +the King, and how he had come quietly down the stairs. + +"I went into the garden," he went on, "and touched Whittington on the +elbow. I told him just what I have explained to you. I said, 'You are a +coward, a liar, a slanderer of women,' and I beat him on the mouth." + +Lady Featherstone uttered a cry and drew herself into an extraordinary +crouching attitude, with her eyes blazing steadily at him. He thought +she meant to spring at him; he looked at that hand upon her heart to see +whether it held a weapon hidden in the fold of her bosom. + +"Go on," she said; "and he?" + +"He answered me in the strangest quiet way imaginable. 'You insulted +Lady Featherstone at Ohlau, Mr. Wogan,' said he, 'one evening when she +hid behind your curtain. It was a very delicate piece of drollery, no +doubt. But I shall be glad to show you another, view of it.' It is +strange how that had rankled in his thoughts. I liked him for it,--upon +my soul, I did,--though it was the only thing I liked in him." + +"Go on," said Lady Featherstone. Mr. Wogan's likes or dislikes were of +no more interest to her than the failure of her effort to hinder the +marriage. + +"We went to the bottom of the garden where there is a little square of +lawn hedged in with myrtle-trees. The night was very dark, so we +stripped to our shirts. From the waist upwards we were visible to each +other as a vague glimmer of white, and thus we fought, foot to foot, +among the myrtle-trees. We could not see so much as our swords unless +they clashed more than usually hard, and a spark struck from them. We +fought by guesswork and feel, and in the end luck served me. I drove my +sword through his chest until the hilt rang upon his breast-bone." + +Then just a movement from Lady Featherstone as though she drew up her +feet beneath her. + +"He lived for perhaps five minutes. He was in great distress lest harm +should come to you; and since there was no one but his enemy to whom he +could speak, why, he spoke to his enemy. I promised him, madam, that +with his death the story should be closed, if you left Italy within the +week." + +"And he?" she interrupted,--"he died there. Well?" + +"You know the laurel hedge by the sun-dial? There is an out-house where +the gardener keeps his tools. I found a spade there, and beneath that +laurel hedge I buried him." + +Lady Featherstone rose to her feet. She spoke no word; she uttered no +cry; her face was white and terrible. She stood rigid like one +paralysed; then she swayed round and fell in a swoon upon the floor. And +as she fell, something bright slipped from her hand and dropped at +Wogan's feet. He picked it up. It was a stiletto. He stood looking down +at the childish figure with a queer compassionate smile upon his face. +"She could love," said he; "yes, she could love." + +He walked out of the house, led his horse back onto the road and mounted +it. The night was gathering; there were purple shadows upon the +Apennines. Wogan rode away alone. + + + + +EPILOGUE + + +Sir Charles Wogan had opportunities enough to appreciate in later years +the accuracy of Maria Vittoria's prophecy. "Here are two people +cross-mated," said she, and events bore her out. The jealousies of +courtiers no doubt had their share in the estrangement of that unhappy +couple, but that was no consolation to Wogan, who saw, within so short a +time of that journey into Italy, James separated from the chosen woman, +and the chosen woman herself seeking the seclusion of a convent. As his +reward he was made Governor of La Mancha in Spain, and no place could +have been found with associations more suitable to this Irishman who +turned his back upon his fortunes at Peri. At La Mancha he lived for +many years, writing a deal of Latin verse, and corresponding with many +distinguished men in England upon matters of the intellect. Matters of +the heart he left alone, and meddled with no more. Nor did any woman +ever ride on his black horse into his city of dreams. He lived and died +a bachelor. The memory of that week when he had rescued his Princess and +carried her through the snows was to the last too vivid in his thoughts. +The thunderous roll of the carriage down the slopes, the sparks +striking from the wheels, the sound of Clementina's voice singing softly +in the darkness of the carriage, the walk under the stars to Ala, the +coming of the dawn about that lonely hut, high-placed amongst the pines. +These recollections bore him company through many a solitary evening. +Somehow the world had gone awry. Clementina, withdrawn into her convent, +was, after all, "wasted," as he had sworn she should not be. James was +fallen upon a deeper melancholy, and diminished hopes. He himself was an +exile alone in his white _patio_ in Spain. In only one point was Maria +Vittoria's prophecy at fault. She had spoken of two who were to find no +mates, and one of the two was herself. She married five years later. + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Clementina, by A.E.W. Mason + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLEMENTINA *** + +***** This file should be named 13567.txt or 13567.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/3/5/6/13567/ + +Produced by Josephine Paolucci Joshua Hutchinson and the PG Online +Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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