The Puppet Crown - Harlod MacGrath (nice books to read TXT) 📗

"Do not forget that soon there will be benefits for those who serve me."

He laughed rudely. "I ask no benefits from your hands, Madame. I would rather stand on the corner and beg." He sent an insolent, contemptuous glance at Kronau, who could not support it. "And now that you have gratified your curiosity, I beg you to withdraw to the street. To-night this palace is a tomb, and woe to those who commit sacrilege."

"The king?" she said, struck by a thought which caused a red spot to appear on each cheek.

"Is dead. Go and leave us in peace."

The wine which had tasted so sweet was full of lees, and the cup wormwood. Madame looked down, while her officers moved uneasily and glanced over their shoulders. Kronau brushed his forehead, to find it wet. Madame regretted the surrendering to the impulse. Her haste to triumph was lacking both in dignity and judgment. She had given the king so little place in her thoughts that the shock of his death confused her. And there was something in the calm, fearless contempt of the young soldier which embarrassed her.

"In that case, Captain," she said, her voice uncertain and constrained, "bid Monseigneur to wait on me at the Continental."

"Whenever that becomes convenient, Madame, Monseigneur will certainly confer with you and your rascally pack of officers." He longed for some one to spring at him; he longed to strike a blow in earnest.

As he leaned against the door he felt it move. He stepped aside. The door rolled back, and her Royal Highness, the archbishop and the chancellor passed in. The princess's eyes were like dim stars, but her fine nostrils palpitated, and her mouth was rigid in disdain. The chancellor looked haggard and dispirited, and he eyed all with the listlessness of a man who has given up hope. The prelate's face was as finely drawn as an ancient cameo, and as immobile. He gazed at Madame with one of those looks which penetrate like acid; and, brave as she was, she found it insupportable. There was a tableau of short duration.

"Madame," said her Royal Highness, with a noble scorn, "what would you say if one desecrated your father's tomb while you were kneeling beside it? What would you say? In yonder room my father lies dead, and your presence here, in whatever role, is an insult. Are you, indeed, a woman? Have you no respect for death and sorrow? Was the bauble so precious to your sight that you could not wait till the last rites were paid to the dead? Is your heart of stone, your mind devoid of pity and of conscience? Are you lacking in magnanimity, which is the disposition of great souls? Ah, Madame, you will never be great, for you have stooped to treachery and deceit. You, a princess! You have purchased with glittering promises that which in time would have been given to you. And you will not fulfill these promises, for honesty has no part in your affair. Shame on you, Madame. By dishonorable means you have gained this room. By dishonorable means you destroyed all those props on which my father leaned. You knew that he had not long to live. Had you come to me as a woman; had you opened your heart to me and confided your desires- Ah, Madame, how gladly would I have listened. Whatever it signifies to you, this throne is nothing to me. Had you come then-but, no! you must come to demand your rights when I am defenseless. You must come with a sword when there is none to defend. Is it possible that in our veins there runs a kindred blood? And yet, Madame, I forgive you. Rule here, if you will; but remember, between you and your crown there will always be the shadow of disgrace. Monsieur," turning toward Fitzgerald, whose shame was so great that it engulfed him, "your father and mine were friends-I forgive you. Now, Madame, I pray you, go, and leave me with my dead."

The girlhood of Princess Alexia was gone forever.

To Madame this rebuke was like hot iron on the flesh. It left her without answer. Her proud spirit writhed. Before those innocent eyes her soul lay bare, offering to the gaze an ineffaceable scar. For the first time she saw her schemes in their true light. Had any served her unselfishly? Aye, there was one. And strangely enough, the first thought which formed in her mind when chaos was passed, was of him.

How would this rebuke affect her in his eyes? What was he to her that she cared for his respect, his opinion, good or bad? What was the meaning of the secret dread? How she hated him for his honesty to her; for now perforce she must look up to him. She had stepped down from the pinnacle of her pride to which she might never again ascend. He had kissed her. How she hated him! And yet . . . Ah, the wine was flat, tinctured with the bitterness of gall, and her own greed had forced the cup to her lips. She could not remain silent before this girl; she must reply; her shame was too deep to resolve itself into silence.

"Mademoiselle," she said, "I beg of you to accept my sympathies; but the fortunes of war-"

"Ah, Madame," interrupted the prelate, lifting his white, attenuated hand, "we will discuss the fortunes of war-later."

Madame choked back the sudden gust of rage. She glanced covertly at the Englishman. But he, with wide-astonished eyes, was staring at the foot of the throne, from which gradually rose a terrible figure, covered with blood and caked with drying clay. The figure leaned heavily on the hilt of a saber, and swayed unsteadily. He drew all eyes.

"Ha!" he said, with a prolonged, sardonic intonation, "is that you, Madame the duchess? You are talking of war? What! and you, my lord the Englishman? Ha! and war? Look at me, Madame; I have been in a battle, the only one fought to-day. Look at me! Here is the mark of that friend who watched over your interests. But where is he? Eh? Where? Did you pick him up on the way? . . . . He is dead. For all that he was a rascal, he died like a man. . .
. . as presently I shall die! Princes and kings and thrones; the one die and the other crumble, but truth lives on. And you, Madame, have learned the truth. Shame on your mean and little souls! There was only one honest man among you, and you dishonored him. The Marshal . . . I do not see him. An honest man dies but once, but a traitor dies a thousand deaths. Kronau .
. . . is that your name? It was an honest one once. And the paltry ends you gain! . . . . The grand duchess of Gerolstein ! .
. . . What a comic opera! Not even music to go by! Eh, you,- you Englishman, has Madame made you a Lieutenant?-a Captain?-a General? What a farce! Nobles, you? I laugh at you all for a pack of thieves, who are not content with the purse, but must add honor to the bag. A man is what he makes himself. Medals and clothes, medals and clothes; that is the sum of your nobility!" He laughed, but the laughter choked in his throat, and he staggered a few paces away from the throne.

"Seize him!" cried Madame.

When the men sprang forward to execute this command, Fitzgerald barred the way.

"No," he said doggedly; "you shall not touch him."

"Stand aside, Monsieur," said Madame, determined to vent her rage on some one.

"Madame," said von Mitter, "I will shoot down the first man who lays a hand on Monsieur Carewe."

The princess, her heart beating wildly at the sudden knowledge that lay written on the inner vision, a faintness stealing away her sight, leaned back against the prelate.

"He is dying," she whispered; "he is dying for me!"

Maurice was now in the grasp of the final delirium. "Come on!" he cried; "come on! I will show you how a brave man can die. Come on, Messieurs Medals and Clothes! Aye, who will go out with me?" He raised the saber, and it caught the flickering light as it trailed a circle above his head. He stumbled toward them, sweeping the air with the blade. Suddenly there came a change. He stopped. The wild expression faded from his face; a surprised look came instead. The saber slipped from his fingers and clanged on the floor. He turned and looked at the princess, and that glance conveyed to her the burden of his love. "Mademoiselle . . . . " His knees doubled, he sank, rolled face downward, and a dark stain appeared and widened on the marble floor.

"Go, Madame," said the prelate. "This palace is indeed a tomb." He felt the princess grow limp on his arm. "Go."

"Maurice!" cried Fitzgerald, springing to the side of the fallen man. "My God! Maurice!"


CHAPTER XXVIII


INTO THE HANDS OF AUSTRIA

Madame, surrounded by her staff and courtiers, sat in the main salon of the Continental Hotel, waiting for the archbishop. The false, self-seeking ministers of Leopold's reign crowded around her to pay their respects, to compliment and to flatter her. Already they saw a brilliant court; already they were speculating on their appointments. Offices were plenty; new embassies were to be created, old embassies to be filled anew.

Madame listened to all coldly. There was a canker in her heart, and no one who saw that calm, beautiful face of hers dreamed how deeply the canker was eating. There were two men who held aloof from compliments and flattery. On the face of one rested a moody scowl; on the other, agony and remorse. These two men were Colonel Mollendorf and Lord Fitzgerald. The same thought occupied each mind; the scene in the throne room.

Presently an orderly announced: "Monseigneur the archbishop."

Madame arose, and all looked expectantly, toward the door.

The old prelate entered, his head high and his step firm. He appeared to see no one but Madame. But this time she met his glance without a tremor.

"Monseigneur," she began, "I have come into my own at last. But for you and your ambitious schemes, all this would not have come to pass. You robbed my father of his throne and set your puppet there instead. By trickery my father was robbed of his lawful inheritance. By trickery I was compelled to regain it. However, I do not wish to make an enemy of you, Monseigneur. I have here two letters. They come from Rome. In one is your recall, in the other a cardinal's hat. Which do you prefer?"

"Surely not the cardinal's hat," said the prelate. "Listen to me, Madame, for I have something to say to you which will cause you some reflection. If I had any ambitions, they are gone; if I had any dreams, they have vanished. Madame, some twenty years ago your duchy was created. It was not done to please Albrecht's younger brother, the duke, your father. Albrecht was childless. When your father was given the duchy it was done to exclude forever the house of Auersperg from reigning on this throne. You say that you were tricked; well, and so was I. Unhappily I touched the deeper current too late.

"This poor king, who lies silent in the palace, was not my puppet. I wished to make him great, and bask