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THE PRISONER OF ZENDA by ANTHONY HOPE

I have done my best to proofread.
Kirk Robinson <[e-mail]>
28 Oct 1993

From the Dover Publications Inc (New York)
edition of 1961

Publication notes:

Originally published 1895 in London by
Henry Holt and Company

Transcription notes:

Italics thus _i_ italics _i_

Bold thus _b_ bold _b_

Underscore thus _u_ underscore _u_  accent
aigu thus Rene'

accent grave thus Se`vres

accent circonflex thus cha^teau

diaresis thus Ko"nigstrasse




The Prisoner of Zenda

Being the History of Three Months in the Life
of an English Gentleman

By

ANTHONY HOPE

PLAN OF THE CASTLE OF
ZENDA.(omitted)

CHAPTER I

THE RASSENDYLLS--WITH A WORD ON
THE ELPHBERGS

"I wonder when in the world you're going to
do anything, Rudolf?" said my brother's wife.

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

"You are nine-and-twenty," she observed,
"and you've done nothing but..."

"Knock about? It is true. Our family doesn't
need to do things."

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

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

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

"I'm so glad Robert's is black!" she cried.

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

"What's the matter, my dear?" he asked.

"She objects to my doing nothing and having
red hair," said I, in an injured tone.

"Oh! of course he can't help his hair,"
admitted Rose.

"It generally crops out once in a generation,"
said my brother. "So does the nose. Rudolf
has got them both."

"I wish they didn't crop out," said Rose, still
flushed.

"I rather like them myself," said I, and, rising,
I bowed to the portrait of Countess Amelia.

My brother's wife uttered an exclamation of
impatience.

"I wish you'd take that picture away, Robert,"
said she.

"My dear!" he cried.

"Good heavens?" I added.

"Then it might be forgotten," she continued.

"Hardly--with Rudolf about," said Robert,
shaking his head.

"Why should it be forgotten?" I asked.

"Rudolf!" exclaimed my brother's wife,
blushing very prettily.

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

"I rather like being an Elphberg myself."

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

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

That is the explanation, and I am glad to have
finished it: the blemishes on honourable
lineage are a delicate subject, and certainly
this heredity we hear so much  about is the
finest scandal-monger in the world; it laughs
at discretion, and writes strange entries
between the lines of the "Peerages."

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

"The difference between you and Robert,"
said my sister-in-law, who often (bless her!)
speaks on a platform, and oftener still as if
she were on one, "is that he recognises the
duties of his position, and you only see the
opportunities of yours."

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

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

"A thousand thanks!" I murmured.

"He's to have an Embassy in six months, and
Robert says he is sure that he'll take you as
an _i_ attache' _i_. Do take it, Rudolf--to
please me."

Now, when my sister-in-law puts the matter
in that way, wrinkling her pretty brows,
twisting her little hands, and growing wistful
in the eyes, all on account of an idle scamp
like myself, for whom she has no natural
responsibility, I am visited with
compunction. Moreover, I thought it possible
that I could pass the time in the position
suggested with some tolerable amusement.
Therefore I said:

"My dear sister, if in six months' time no
unforeseen obstacle has arisen, and Sir Jacob
invites me, hang me if I don't go with Sir
Jacob!"

"Oh, Rudolf, how good of you! I am glad!"

"Where's he going to?"

"He doesn't know yet; but it's sure to be a
good Embassy."

"Madame," said I, "for your sake I'll go, if it's
no more than a beggarly legation. When I do
a thing, I don't do it by halves."

My promise, then, was given; but six months
are six months, and seem an eternity, and,
inasmuch as they stretched between me and
my prospective industry (I suppose _i_
attache's _i_ are industrious; but I know not,
for I never became _i_ attache'_i_ to Sir Jacob
or to anybody else), I cast about for some
desirable mode of spending them. And it
occurred to me suddenly that I would visit
Ruritania. It may seem strange that I had
never visited that country yet; but my father
(in spite of a sneaking fondness for the
Elphbergs, which led him to give me, his
second son, the famous Elphberg name of
Rudolf) had always been averse from my
going, and, since his death, my brother,
prompted by Rose, had accepted the family
tradition which taught that a wide berth was
to be given to that country. But the moment
Ruritania had come into my head I was eaten
up with curiosity to see it. After all, red hair
and long noses are not confined to the  House
of Elphberg, and the old story seemed a
preposterously insufficient reason for
debarring myself from acquaintance with an
highly interesting and. important kingdom,
one which had played no small part in
European history, and might do the like again
under the sway of a young and vigorous
ruler, such as the new king was rumoured to
be. My determination was clinched by
reading in _i_ The Times _i_ that Rudolf the
Fifth was to be crowned at Strelsau in the
course of the next three weeks, and that great
magnificence was to mark the occasion. At
once I made up my mind to be present, and
began my preparations.

But, inasmuch as it has never been my
practice to furnish my relatives with an
itinerary of my journeys and in this case I
anticipated opposition to my wishes, I gave
out that I was going for a ramble in the
Tyrol--an old haunt of mine--and propitiated
Rose's wrath by declaring that I intended to
study the political and social problems of the
interesting community which dwells in that
neighbourhood.

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

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Well," said I, carelessly, "there seems a gap
that might be filled by an exhaustive work
on--"

"Oh! will you write a book?" she cried,
clapping her hands. "That would be splendid,
wouldn't it, Robert?"

"It's the best of introductions to political life
nowadays," observed my brother, who has,
by the way, introduced himself in this
manner several times over. Burlesdon on
Ancient Theories and Modern Facts and The
Ultimate Outcome, by a Political Student, are
both works of recognised eminence.

"I believe you are right, Bob, my boy," said I.

"Now promise you'll do it," said Rose
earnestly.

"No, I won't promise; but if I find enough
material, I will."

"That's fair enough," said Robert.

"Oh! material doesn't matter," she said,
pouting.

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

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

CHAPTER II CONCERNING THE COLOUR
OF MEN'S HAIR

IT was a maxim of my Uncle William's that
no man should pass through Paris without
spending four-and-twenty hours there. My
uncle spoke out of a ripe experience of the
world, and I honoured his advice by putting
up for a day and a night at "The Continental"
on my way to--the Tyrol. I called on George
Featherly at the Embassy, and we had a bit of
dinner together at Durand's, and afterwards
dropped in to the Opera; and after that we
had a little supper, and after that we called
on Bertram Bertrand, a versifier of some
repute and Paris correspondent to _i_ The
Critic _i_. He had a very comfortable little
suite of rooms, and we found some pleasant
fellows smoking and talking. It struck me,
however, that Bertram himself was absent
and in low spirits, and when everybody
except ourselves had gone, I rallied him on
his moping preoccupation. He fenced with
me for a while, but at last, flinging himself on
a sofa, he exclaimed:

"Very well; have it your own way. I am in
love--infernally in love!"

"Oh, you'll write the better poetry," said I, by
way of consolation.

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

"If it's the old affair," said he, "you may as
well throw it up, Bert. She's leaving Paris
to-morrow."

"! know that," snapped Bertram.

"Not that it would make any difference if she
stayed," pursued the relentless George. "She
flies higher than the paper-trade, my boy!"

"Hang her!" said Bertram.

"It would make it more interesting for me," I
ventured to observe, "If I knew who you
were talking about."

"Antoinette Mauban," said George.

"De Mauban," growled Bertram.

"Oho!" said I, passing by the question of the
_i_ de _i_. "You don't mean to say, Bert--?"

"Can't you let me alone?"

"Where's she going to?" I asked, for the lady
was something of a celebrity.

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

"Nobody knows. By the way, Bert, I met a
great man at her house the other night--at
least, about a month ago. Did you ever meet
him--the Duke of Strelsau?"

"Yes, I did," growled Bertram.

"An extremely accomplished man, I thought
him."

It was not hard to see that George's
references to the duke were intended to
aggravate poor Bertram's sufferings, so that I
drew the inference that the duke had
distinguished Madame de Mauban by his
attentions. She was a widow, rich, handsome,
and, according to repute,  ambitious. It was
quite possible that she, as George put it, was
flying as high as a personage who was
everything he could be, short of enjoying
strictly royal rank: for the  duke was the son
of the late King of Ruritania by a second and
morganatic marriage, and half-brother to the
new king. He had been his father's favourite,
and it had  occasioned some unfavourable
comment when he had been created a duke,
with a title derived from no less a city than
the capital itself. His mother had been of
good, but not exalted, birth.

"He's not in Paris now, is he?" I asked.

"Oh no! He's gone back to be present at the
king's coronation; a ceremony which, I should
say, he'll not enjoy much. But, Bert, old man,
don't despair! He won't marry the  fair
Antoinette--at least, not unless another plan
comes to nothing. Still, perhaps, she---" He
paused and added, with a laugh: "Royal
attentions are hard to resist--you know that,
don't you, Rudolf?"

"Confound you!" said I; and rising, I left the
hapless Bertram in George's hands and went
home to bed.

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

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

"You've got a charming travelling
companion," he said. "That's poor Bert
Bertrand's goddess, Antoinette de Mauban,
and, like you, she's going to Dresden--also, no
doubt, to see the pictures. It's very queer,
though, that she doesn't at present desire the
honour of your acquaintance."

"I didn't ask to be introduced," I observed, a
little annoyed. "Well, I offered to bring you to
her; but she said, 'Another time.' Never mind,
old fellow, perhaps there'll be a smash, and
you'll have a chance of rescuing her and
cutting out the Duke of Strelsau!"

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

As soon as we reached the Ruritanian frontier
(where the old officer who presided over the
Custom House favoured me with such a stare
that I felt surer than before of my Elphberg
physiognomy), I bought the papers, and
found in them news which affected my
movements. For some reason, which was not
clearly explained and seemed to be
something of a mystery, the date of the
coronation had been suddenly advanced, and
the ceremony was to take place on the next
day but one. The whole country seemed  in a
stir about it, and it was evident that Strelsau
was thronged. Rooms were all let and hotels
overflowing; there would be very little
chance of my obtaining a lodging, and I
should certainly have to pay an exorbitant
charge for it. I made up my mind to stop at
Zenda, a small town fifty miles short of the
capital, and about ten from the frontier. My
train reached there in the evening; I would
spend the next day, Tuesday, in a wander
over the hills, which were said to be very
fine, and in taking a glance at the famous
Castle, and go over by train to Strelsau on the
Wednesday morning, returning at night to
sleep at Zenda.

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

I was very kindly received at the hotel--it was
really no more than an inn--kept by a fat old
lady and her two daughters. They were good,
quiet people, and seemed very little
interested in the great doings at Strelsau. The
old lady's hero was the duke, for he was now,
under the late king's will, master of the
Zenda estates and of the Castle, which rose
grandly on its steep hill at the end of the
valley, a mile or so from the inn. The old
lady, indeed, did not hesitate to express
regret that the duke was not on the throne,
instead of his brother.

"We know Duke Michael," said she. "He has
always lived among us; every Ruritanian
knows Duke Michael. But the king is almost
a stranger; he has been so much abroad, not
one in ten knows him even by sight."

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

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

"Johann, the duke's keeper. He has seen the
king."

"Ah, yes. The king, sir, is now at the duke's
shooting-lodge in the forest here; from here
he goes to Strelsau to be crowned on
Wednesday morning."

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

"Ah! and I wish he would stay at his
shooting--that and wine (and one thing more)
are all he loves, they say,--and suffer our
duke to be crowned on Wednesday. That I
wish, and I don't care who knows it."

"Hush, mother!" urged the daughters.

"Oh, there's many to think as I do!" cried the
old woman stubbornly.

I threw myself back in my deep arm-chair,
and laughed at her zeal.

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

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

"Many a man has cursed their red hair before
now," muttered the old lady--and I
remembered James, fifth Ear] of Burlesdon.

"But never a woman", cried the girl.

"Ay, and women, when it was too late," was
the stern answer, reducing the girl to silence
and blushes.

"How comes the king here?" I asked, to break
an embarrassed silence. "It is the duke's land
here, you say."

"The duke invited him, sir, to rest here till
Wednesday. The duke is at Strelsau,
preparing the king's reception."

"Then they're friends?"

"None better," said the old lady.

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

"Ay, they love one another as men do who
want the same place and the same wife!"

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

"What, the same wife, too! How's that, young
lady?"

"All the world knows that Black
Michael--well then, mother, the duke--would
give his soul to marry his cousin, the Princess
Flavia, and that she is to be the queen."

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

"It's little dealing Black Michael has with--"
began the girl, braving her mother's anger;
but as she spoke a heavy step sounded on the
floor, and a gruff voice asked in a
threatening tone:

"Who talks of 'Black Michael' in his
Highness's own burgh?"

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

"You'll not tell of me, Johann?" she said.

"See where your chatter leads," said the old
lady. The man who had spoken came
forward.

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

"What ails you, Johann?" asked the eider girl.
"This is a gentleman on his travels, come to
see the coronation."

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

"Good-evening to you," said I.

"Good-evening, sir," he muttered, still
scrutinising me, and the merry girl began to
laugh as she called:

"See, Johann, it is the colour you love! He
started to see your hair, sir. It's not the colour
we see most of here in Zenda."

"I crave your pardon, sir," stammered the
fellow, with puzzled eyes. "I expected to see
no one."

"Give him a glass to drink my health in; and
I'll bid you good-night, and thanks to you,
ladies, for your courtesy and pleasant
conversation."

So speaking, I rose to my feet, and with a
slight bow turned to the door. The young girl
ran to light me on the way, and the man fell
back to let me pass, his eyes still fixed on me.
The moment I was by, he started a step
forward, asking: "Pray, sir, do you know our
king?"

"I never saw him," said I. "I hope to do so on
Wednesday." He said no more, but I felt his
eyes following me till the door closed behind
me. My saucy conductor, looking over her
shoulder at me as she preceded me upstairs,
said:

"There's no pleasing Master Johann for one of
your colour, sir."

"He prefers yours, may be?" I suggested.

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

"What," asked I, taking hold of the other side
of the candlestick, "does colour matter in a
man?"

"Nay, but I love yours--it's the Elphberg red."

"Colour in a man," said I, "Is a matter of no
more moment than that!"--and I gave her
something of no value.

"God send the kitchen-door be shut!" said
she.

"Amen!" said I, and left her.

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

CHAPTER III  A MERRY EVENING WITH A
DISTANT RELATIVE

I was not so unreasonable as to be prejudiced
against the duke's keeper because he disliked
my complexion; and if I had been, his most
civil and obliging conduct (as it  seemed to
me to be) next morning would have disarmed
me. Hearing that I was bound for Strelsau, he
came to see me while I was breakfasting, and
told me that a sister of his, who had married
a well-to-do tradesman and lived in the
capital, had invited him to occupy a room in
her house. He had gladly accepted, but now
found that his duties  would not permit of his
absence. He begged therefore that, if such
humble (though, as he added, clean and
comfortable) lodgings would satisfy me, I
would take his place. He pledged his sister's
acquiescence, and urged the inconvenience
and crowding to which I should be subject in
my journeys to and from Strelsau the next
day. I accepted his offer without a moment's
hesitation, and he  went off to telegraph to
his sister, while I packed up and prepared to
take the next train. But I still hankered after
the forest and the shooting-lodge, and when
my little maid told me that I could, by
walking ten miles or so through the forest, hit
the railway at a roadside station, I decided to
send my luggage direct to the address which
Johann had given, take my walk, and follow
to Strelsau myself. Johann had gone off and
was not aware of the change in my plans; but,
as its only effect was to delay my arrival at
his sister's for a few hours, there was no
reason for troubling to inform him of it.
Doubtless the good lady would waste no
anxiety on my account.

I took an early luncheon, and, having bidden
my kind entertainers farewell, promising to
return to them on my way home, I set out to
climb the hill that led to the Castle, and
thence to the forest of Zenda.

Half-an-hour's leisurely walking brought me
to the Castle. It had been a fortress in old
days, and the ancient keep was still in good
preservation and very imposing. Behind it
stood another portion of the original castle,
and behind that again, and separated from it
by a deep and broad moat, which ran all
round the old buildings, was a handsome
modern  _i_ cha^teau _i_ , erected by the last
king, and now forming the country residence
of the Duke of Strelsau. The old and the new
portions were connected by a drawbridge,
and this indirect mode of access formed the
only passage between the old building and
the outer world; but leading to the modern
_i_ cha^teau _i_  there was a broad and
handsome avenue. It was an ideal residence:
when "Black Michael" desired company, he
could dwell in his  _i_ cha^teau _i_ ; if a fit of
misanthropy seized him, he had merely to
cross the bridge and draw it up after him (it
ran on rollers), and nothing short of a
regiment and a train of artillery could fetch
him out. I went on my way, glad that poor
Black Michael, though he could not have the
throne or the princess, had, at least, as fine a
residence as any prince in Europe.

Soon I entered the forest, and walked on for
an hour or more in its cool sombre shade. The
great trees enlaced with one another over my
head, and the sunshine stole  through in
patches as bright as diamonds and hardly
bigger. I was enchanted with the place, and,
finding a felled tree-trunk, propped my back
against it, and stretching my legs out gave
myself up to undisturbed  contemplation of
the solemn beauty of the woods and to the
comfort of a good cigar. And when the cigar
was finished and I had (I suppose) inhaled as
much beauty as I could, I went off into the
most delightful sleep,  regardless of my train
to Strelsau and of the fast-waning afternoon.
To remember a train in such a spot would
have been rank sacrilege. Instead of that, I
fell to dreaming  that I was married to the
Princess Flavia and dwelt in the Castle of
Zenda, and beguiled whole days with my
love in the glades of the forest--which made a
very pleasant dream. In fact, I was just
impressing a fervent kiss on the charming
lips of the princess, when I heard (and the
voice seemed at first a part of the dream)
someone exclaim, in rough strident tones:

"Why, the devil's in it! Shave him, and he'd
be the king!"

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

I opened my eyes, and found two men
regarding me with much curiosity. Both wore
shooting costumes and carried guns. One was
rather short and very stoutly built, with a big
bullet shaped head, a bristly grey moustache,
and small pale-blue eyes, a trifle bloodshot.
The other was a slender young fellow, of
middle height, dark in complexion, and
bearing himself with grace and  distinction. I
set the one down as an old soldier; the other
for a gentleman accustomed to move in good
society, but not unused to military life either.
It turned out  afterwards that my guess was a
good one.

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

"He's the height, too!" I heard the eider
murmur, as he surveyed my six feet two
inches of stature. Then, with a cavalier touch
of the cap, he addressed me:

"May I ask your name?"

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

The young man stepped forward with a
pleasant smile.

"This," said he, "Is Colonel Sapt, and I am
called Fritz von Tarlenheim: we are both in
the service of the King of Ruritania."

I bowed and, baring my head, answered:

"I am Rudolf Rassendyll. I am a traveller
from England; and once for a year or two I
held a commission from Her Majesty the
Queen."

"Then we are all brethren of the sword,"
answered Tarlenheim, holding out his hand,
which I took readily.

"Rassendyll, Rassendyll!" muttered Colonel
Sapt; then a gleam of intelligence flitted
across his face.

"By Heaven!" he cried, "you're of the
Burlesdons?"

"My brother is now Lord Burlesdon," said I.

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

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

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

"Known!" cried Sapt. "If you stay here, the
deuce a man in all Ruritania will doubt of
it--or a woman either."

I began to feel uncomfortable. Had I realised
what a very plainly-written pedigree I carried
about with me, I should have thought long
before I visited Ruritania. However, I  was in
for it now.

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

"Fritz, Fritz! where are you, man?,
Tarlenheim started, and said hastily: "It's the
king!"

Old Sapt chuckled again.

Then a young man jumped out from behind
the trunk of a tree and stood beside us. As I
looked on him, I uttered an astonished cry;
and he, seeing me, drew back in sudden
wonder. Saving the hair on my face and a
manner of conscious dignity which his
position gave him, saving also that he lacked
perhaps half-an-inch--nay, less than that, but
still something--of my height, the King of
Ruritania might have been Rudolf
Rassendyll, and I, Rudolf, the King.

For an instant we stood motionless, looking
at one another. Then I bared my head again
and bowed respectfully. The king found his
voice, and asked in bewilderment:

"Colonel--Fritz--who is this gentleman?"

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

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

"Well met, cousin!" he cried, stepping up to
me, clapping me on the back, and laughing
still. "You must forgive me if I was taken
aback. A man doesn't expect to see double at
this time of day, eh, Fritz?"

"I must pray pardon, sire, for my
presumption," said I. "I trust it will not forfeit
your Majesty's favour."

"By Heaven! you'll always enjoy the king's
countenance," he laughed, "whether I like it
or not; and, sir, I shall very gladly add to it
what services I can. Where are you travelling
to?"

"To Strelsau, sire,--to the coronation."

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

"Fritz, Fritz!" he cried, "a thousand crowns for
a sight of brother Michael's face when he sees
a pair of us!" and the merry laugh rang out
again.

"Seriously," observed Fritz von Tarlenheim,
"I question Mr. Rassendyll's wisdom in
visiting Strelsau just now."

The king lit a cigarette.

"Well, Sapt?" said he, questioningly.

"He mustn't go," growled the old fellow.

"Come, colonel, you mean that I should be in
Mr. Rassendyll's debt, if--"

"Oh, ay! wrap it up in the right way," said
Sapt, hauling a great pipe out of his pocket.

"Enough, sire," said I. "I'll leave Ruritania
to-day."

"Now, by thunder, you shan't--and that's _i_
sans phrase _i_ , as Sapt likes it. For you shall
dine with me to-night, happen what will
afterwards. Come, man, you don't meet a
new relation every day!"

"We dine sparingly to-night," said Fritz von
Tarlenheim.

"Not we--with our new cousin for a guest!"
cried the king; and, as Fritz shrugged his
shoulders, he added: "Oh! I'll remember our
early start, Fritz."

"So will I--to-morrow morning," said old
Sapt, pulling at his pipe.

"0 wise old Sapt!"cried the king. "Come, Mr.
Rassendyll--by the way, what name did they
give you?"

"Your Majesty's," I answered, bowing.

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

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

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

Suddenly emerging from the wood, we came
on a small and rude shooting-lodge. It was a
one-story building, a sort of bungalow, built
entirely of wood. As we approached it, a little
man in a plain livery came out to meet us.
The only other person I saw about the place
was a fat elderly woman, whom I afterwards
discovered to be the mother of Johann, the
duke's keeper.

"Well, is dinner ready, Josef?" asked the king.

The little servant informed us that it was, and
we soon sat down to a plentiful meal. The
fare was plain enough: the king ate heartily,
Fritz von Tarlenheim delicately, old Sapt
voraciously. I played a good knife and fork,
as my custom is; the king noticed my
performance with approval.

"We're all good trenchermen, we Elphbergs,"
said he. "But what?--we're eating dry! Wine,
Josef! wine, man! Are we beasts, to eat
without drinking? Are we cattle, Josef?"

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

"Remember to-morrow!" said Fritz.

"Ay--to-morrow!" said old Sapt.

The king drained a bumper to his "Cousin
Rudolf," as he was gracious--or
merry--enough to call me; and I drank its
fellow to the "Elphberg Red," whereat he
laughed loudly.

Now, be the meat what it might, the wine we
drank was beyond all price or praise, and we
did it justice. Fritz ventured once to stay the
king's hand.

"What?" cried the king. "Remember you start
before I do, Master Fritz--you must be more
sparing by two hours than I."

Fritz saw that I did not understand.

"The colonel and I," he explained, "leave here
at six: we ride down to Zenda and return with
the guard of honour to fetch the king at eight,
and then we all ride together to the station."

"Hang that same guard!" growled Sapt.

"Oh! it's very civil of my brother to ask the
honour for his regiment" said the king.
"Come, cousin, you need not start early.
Another bottle, man!"

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

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

"I have drunk enough," said he.

"Far be it from me to contradict the king,"
said I.

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

While I yet spoke, Josef came and set before
the king a marvellous old wicker-covered
flagon. It had lain so long in some darkened
cellar that it seemed to blink in the
candlelight.

"His Highness the Duke of Strelsau bade me
set this wine before the king, when the king
was weary of all other wines and pray the
king to drink, for the love that he bears his
brother."

"Well done, Black Michael!" said the king.
"Out with the cork, Josef. Hang him! Did he
think I'd flinch from his bottle?"

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

"Gentlemen, my friends--Rudolf, my cousin
('tis a scandalous story, Rudolf, on my
honour!) everything is yours to the half of
Ruritania. But ask me not for a single drop of
this divine bottle, which I will drink to the
health of that--that sly knave, my brother,
Black Michael."

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

And we drank pleasant dreams to his
Majesty--and that is all I remember of the
evening. Perhaps it is enough.

CHAPTER IV THE KING KEEPS HIS
APPOINTMENT

WHETHER I had slept a minute or a year I
knew not. I awoke with a start and a shiver;
my face, hair, and clothes dripped water, and
opposite me stood old Sapt, a sneering smile
on his face and an empty bucket in his hand.
On the table by him sat Fritz von Tarlenheim,
pale as a ghost and black as a crow under the
eyes.

I leapt to my feet in anger.

"Your joke goes too far, sir!" I cried.

"Tut, man, we've no time for quarrelling.
Nothing else would rouse you. It's five
o'clock."

"I'll thank you, Colonel Sapt--" I began again,
hot in spirit, though I was uncommonly cold
in body.

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

The king lay full length on the floor. His face
was red as his hair, and he breathed heavily.
Sapt, the disrespectful old dog, kicked him
sharply. He did not stir, nor was there any
break in his breathing. I saw that his face and
head were wet with water, as were mine.

"We've spent half an hour on him," said Fritz.

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

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

"Was it drugged--that last bottle?" I asked in a
whisper.

"I don't know," said Sapt. "We must get a
doctor."

"There's none within ten miles, and a
thousand doctors wouldn't take him to
Strelsau to-day. I know the look of it. He'll
not move for six or seven hours yet."

"But the coronation!" I cried in horror.

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

"We must send word that he's ill," he said. "I
suppose so," said I.

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

"If he's not crowned to-day," said he, "I'll lay
a crown he's never crowned."

"But, heavens, why?"

"The whole nation's there to meet him; half
the army--ay, and Black Michael at the head.
Shall we send word that the king's drunk?"

"That he's ill," said I, in correction.

"Ill!" echoed Sapt, with a scornful laugh.
"They know his illnesses too well. He's been
'ill' before!"

"Well, we must chance what they think," said
Fritz helplessly. "I'll carry the news and make
the best of it."

Sapt raised his hand.

"Tell me," said he. "Do you think the king
was drugged?"

"I do," said I.

"And who drugged him?"

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

"Ay," said Sapt, "that he might not come to be
crowned. Rassendyll here doesn't know our
pretty Michael. What think you, Fritz, has
Michael no king ready? Has half Strelsau no
other candidate? As God's alive, man, the
throne's lost if the king show himself not in
Strelsau to-day. I know Black Michael."

"We could carry him there," said I.

"And a very pretty picture he makes,"
sneered Sapt.

Fritz von Tarlenheim buried his face in his
hands. The king breathed loudly and heavily.
Sapt stirred him again with his foot.

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

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

"As a man grows old he believes in Fate. Fate
sent you here. Fate sends you now to
Strelsau."

I staggered back, murmuring "Good God!"

Fritz looked up with an eager, bewildered
gaze.

"Impossible!" I muttered. "I should be
known."

"It's a risk--against a certainty," said Sapt. "If
you shave, I'll wager you'll not be known.
Are you afraid?"

"Sir!"

"Come, lad, there, there; but it's your life, you
know, if you're known--and mine--and Fritz's
here. But, if you don't go, I swear to you
Black Michael will sit to-night on the throne,
and the king lie in prison or his grave."

"The king would never forgive it," I
stammered.

"Are we women? Who cares for his
forgiveness?"

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

"You'll go?"

"Yes, I'll go," said I, and I turned my eyes on
the prostrate figure of the king on the floor.

"To-night," Sapt went on in a hasty whisper,
"we are to lodge in the Palace. The moment
they leave us you and I will mount our
horses--Fritz must stay there and guard the
king's room-and ride here at a gallop. The
king will be ready--Josef will tell him--and he
must ride back with me to Strelsau, and you
ride as if the devil were behind you to the
frontier."

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

"There's a chance," said Fritz, with his first
sign of hopefulness.

"If I escape detection," said I.

"If we're detected," said Sapt, "I'll send Black
Michael down below before I go myself, so
help me heaven! Sit in that chair, man."

I obeyed him.

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

Suddenly Fritz smote on his thigh:

"But the guard! They'll know! they'll know!"

"Pooh! We shan't wait for the guard. We'll
ride to Hofbau and catch a train there. When
they come, the bird'Il be flown."

"But the king?"

"The king will be in the wine-cellar. I'm going
to carry him there now."

"If they find him?"

"They won't. How should they? Josef will put
them off."

"But--"

Sapt stamped his foot.

"We're not playing," he roared. "My God!
don't I know the risk? If they do find him,
he's no worse off than if he isn't crowned
to-day in Strelsau."

So speaking, he flung the door open and,
stooping, put forth a strength I did not dream
he had, and lifted the king in his hands. And
as he did so, the old woman, Johann the
keeper's mother, stood in the doorway. For a
moment she stood, then she turned on her
heel, without a sign of  surprise, and clattered
down the passage.

"Has she heard?" cried Fritz.

"I'll shut her mouth!" said Sapt grimly, and he
bore off the king in his arms.

For me, I sat down in an arm-chair, and as I
sat there, half dazed, Josef clipped and
scraped me till my moustache and imperial
were things of the past and my face was as
bare as the king's. And when Fritz saw me
thus he drew a long breath and exclaimed:

"By Jove, we shall do it!"

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

"She swore she'd heard nothing," said he; but
to make sure I tied her legs together and put
a handkerchief in her mouth and bound her
hands, and locked her up in the coal-cellar,
next door to the king. Josef'll look after them
both later on."

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

"I fancy," said he, "that when Josef tells them
the king is gone they'll think it is because we
smelt a rat. For you may swear Black Michael
doesn't expect to see him in Strelsau to-day."

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

"Thank God, he shaved his beard!" he
exclaimed.

"Why did he?", I asked.

"Because Princess Flavia said he grazed her
cheek when he was graciously pleased to give
her a cousinly kiss. Come though, we must
ride."

"Is all safe here?"

"Nothing's safe anywhere," said Sapt, "but we
can make it no safer."

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

The cool morning air cleared my head, and I
was able to take in all Sapt said to me. He
was wonderful. Fritz hardly spoke, riding like
a man asleep, but Sapt, without another
word for the king, began at once to instruct
me most minutely in the history of my past
life, of my family, of my tastes, pursuits,
weaknesses, friends, companions, and
servants. He told me the etiquette of the
Ruritanian Court, promising to be constantly
at my elbow to point out everybody whom I
ought to know, and give me hints with what
degree of favour to greet them.

"By the way," he said, "you're a Catholic, I
suppose?"

"Not I," I answered.

"Lord, he's a heretic!" groaned Sapt, and
forthwith he fell to a rudimentary lesson in
the practices and observances of the Romish
faith.

"Luckily," said he, "you won't be expected to
know much, for the king's notoriously lax
and careless about such matters. But you
must be as civil as butter to the Cardinal. We
hope to win him over, because he and
Michael have a standing quarrel about their
precedence."

We were by now at the station. Fritz had
recovered nerve enough to explain to the
astonished station-master that the king had
changed his plans. The train steamed up. We
got into a first-class carriage, and Sapt,
leaning back on the cushions, went on with
his lesson. I looked at my watch--the king's
watch it was, of course. It was just eight.

"I wonder if they've gone to look for us," I
said.

"I hope they won't find the king," said Fritz
nervously, and this time it was Sapt who
shrugged his shoulders.

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

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

"I'm not made of stone!" I exclaimed.

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

Fritz did as he was bid.

"We're an hour early," said Sapt. "We'll send
word forward of your Majesty's arrival, for
there'll be no one here to meet us yet. And
meanwhile--"

"Meanwhile," said I, "the king'Il be hanged if
he doesn't have some breakfast."

Old Sapt chuckled, and held out his hand.

"You're an Elphberg, every inch of you," said
he. Then he paused, and looking at us, said
quietly, "God send we may be alive to-night!"

"Amen!" said Fritz von Tarlenheim.

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

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

King Rudolf the Fifth was in his good city of
Strelsau! And they shouted outside:

"God save the King!"

Old Sapt's mouth wrinkled into a smile.

"God save 'em both!" he whispered.
"Courage, lad!" and I felt his hand press my
knee.

CHAPTER V THE ADVENTURES OF AN
UNDERSTUDY

WITH Fritz von Tarlenheim and Colonel Sapt
close behind me, I stepped out of the buffet
on to the platform. The last thing I did was to
feel if my revolver were handy and my sword
loose in the scabbard. A gay group of officers
and high dignitaries stood waiting me, at
their head a tall old man, covered with
medals, and of military beating. He wore the
yellow-and-red ribbon of the Red Rose of
Ruritania--which, by the way, decorated my
unworthy breast also.

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

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

"The Chancellor of the Kingdom," whispered
Sapt.

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

Presently we formed procession and took our
way to the door of the station. Here I
mounted my horse, the Marshal holding my
stirrup. The civil dignitaries went off to their
carriages, and I started to ride through the
streets with the Marshal on my right and Sapt
(who, as my chief  _i_ aide-de-camp _i_ ,

was entitled to the place) on my left. The city
of Strelsau is partly old and partly new.
Spacious modern boulevards and residential
quarters surround and embrace the narrow,
tortuous and picturesque streets of the
original town. In the outer circles the upper
classes live; in the inner the shops are
situated; and, behind their prosperous fronts,
lie hidden populous but wretched lanes and
alleys, filled with a poverty-stricken,
turbulent, and (in large measure) criminal
class. These social and local divisions
corresponded, as I knew from Sapt's
information, to another division more
important to me. The New Town was for the
king; but to the Old Town Michael of
Strelsau was a hope, a hero, and a darling.

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

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

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

Well, we went by; and then the Marshal,
turning round in his saddle, waved his hand,
and the Cuirassiers closed round us, so that
the crowd could not come near me. We were
leaving my quarter and entering Duke
Michael's, and this action of the Marshal's
showed me more clearly than words what the
state of feeling in the town must be. But  if
Fate made me a king, the least I could do was
to play the part handsomely.

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

The Marshal bit his white moustache.

"It is more prudent, sire," he murmured.

I drew rein.

"Let those in front ride on," said I, "till they
are fifty yards ahead. But do you, Marshal,
and Colonel Sapt and my friends wait here
till I have ridden fifty yards. And see that no
one is nearer to me. I will have my people see
that their king trusts them."

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

"Am I not understood?" said I; and, biting his
moustache again, he gave the orders. I saw
old Sapt smiling into his beard, but he shook
his head at me. If I had been killed in open
day in the streets of Strelsau, Sapt's position
would have been a difficult one.

Perhaps I ought to say that I was dressed all
in white, except my boots. I wore a silver
helmet with gilt ornaments, and the broad
ribbon of the Rose looked well across my
chest. I should be paying a poor compliment
to the king if I did not set modesty aside and
admit that I made a very fine figure. So the
people thought; for when I, riding alone,
entered the dingy, sparsely-decorated,
sombre streets of the Old Town, there was
first a murmur, then a cheer, and a woman,
from a window above a cook shop, cried the
old local saying:

"If he's red, he's right!" whereat I laughed and
took off my helmet that she might see that I
was of the right colour, and they cheered me
again at that.

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

"He looks paler than his wont," said one.

"You'd look pale if you lived as he does," was
the highly disrespectful retort.

"He's a bigger man than I thought," said
another.

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

"The pictures of him aren't handsome
enough," declared a pretty girl, taking great
care that I should hear. No doubt it was mere
flattery.

But, in spite of these signs of approval and
interest, the mass of the people received me
in silence and with sullen looks, and my dear
brother's portrait ornamented most of the
windows--which was an ironical sort of
greeting to the king. I was quite glad that he
had been spared the unpleasant sight. He was
a man of quick temper, and perhaps he
would not have taken it so placidly as I did.

At last we were at the Cathedral. Its great
grey front, embellished with hundreds of
statues and boasting a pair of the finest oak
doors in Europe, rose for the first time before
me, and the sudden sense of my audacity
almost overcame me. Everything was in a
mist as I dismounted. I saw the Marshal and
Sapt dimly, and dimly the throng of
gorgeously-robed priests who awaited me.
And my eyes were still dim as I walked up
the great nave, with the pealing of the organ
in my ears. I saw nothing of the brilliant
throng that filled it, I hardly distinguished
the stately figure of the Cardinal as he rose
from the archiepiscopal throne to greet me.
Two faces only stood out side by side clearly
before my eyes--the face of a girl, pale and
lovely, surmounted by a crown of the
glorious Elphberg hair (for in a woman it is
glorious), and the face of a man, whose
full-blooded red cheeks, black hair, and dark
deep eyes told me that at last I was in
presence of my brother, Black Michael. And
when he saw me his red cheeks went pale all
in a moment, and his helmet fell with a
clatter on the floor. Till that moment, I
believe that he had not realised that the king
was in very truth come to Strelsau.

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

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

"Her Royal Highness the Princess Flavia!"

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

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

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

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

"And when's the wedding?" and as he spoke
another struck him in the face, crying "Long
live Duke Michael!" and the princess
coloured--it was an admirable tint--and
looked straight in front of her.

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

"Do you know, Rudolf," said she, "you look
somehow different to-day?"

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

"You look," she went on, "more sober, more
sedate; you're almost careworn, and I declare
you're thinner. Surely it's not possible that
you've begun to take anything seriously?"

The princess seemed to hold of the king
much the same opinion that Lady Burlesdon
held of me.

I braced myself up to the conversation.
"Would that please you?" I asked softly.

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

"Whatever pleases you I try to do," I said;
and, as I saw her smile and blush, I thought
that I was playing the king's hand very well
for him. So I continued, and what I said was
perfectly true:

"I assure you, my dear cousin, that nothing in
my life has affected me more than the
reception I've been greeted with to-day."

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

"Did you notice Michael?"

"Yes," said I, adding, "He wasn't enjoying
himself."

"Do be careful!" she went on. "You
don't--indeed you don't --keep enough watch
on him. You know--"

"I know," said I, "that he wants what I've got."

"Yes. Hush!"

Then--and I can't justify it, for I committed
the king far beyond what I had a right to
do--I suppose she carried me off my feet--I
went on:

"And perhaps also something which I haven't
got yet, but hope to win some day."

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

"Haven't you enough responsibilities on you
for one day, Cousin?"

Bang, bang! Blare, blare! We were at the
Palace. Guns were firing and trumpets
blowing. Rows of lackeys stood waiting, and,
handing the princess up the broad marble
staircase, I took formal possession, as a
crowned king, of the House of my ancestors,
and sat down at my own table,  with my
cousin on my right hand, on her other side
Black Michael, and on my left his Eminence
the Cardinal. Behind my chair stood Sapt;
and at the end of the table, I saw  Fritz von
Tarlenheim drain to the bottom his glass of
champagne rather sooner than he decently
should.

I wondered what the King of Ruritania was
doing.

CHAPTER VI THE SECRET OF A CELLAR

WE were in the king's dressing-room--Fritz
von Tarlenheim, Sapt, and I. I flung myself
exhausted into an arm-chair. Sapt lit his pipe.
He uttered no congratulations on the
marvellous success of our wild risk, but his
whole bearing was eloquent of satisfaction.
The triumph, aided perhaps by good wine,
had made a new man of Fritz.

"What a day for you to remember!" he cried.
"Gad, I'd like to be a king for twelve hours
myself! But, Rassendyll, you mustn't throw
your heart too much into the part. I don't
wonder Black Michael looked blacker than
ever--you and the princess had so much to
say to one another."

"How beautiful she is!" I exclaimed.

"Never mind the women," growled Sapt. "Are
you ready to start?"

"Yes," said I, with a sigh.

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

"You'll be lucky," observed Sapt grimly, "If
you're not the late Rudolf Rassendyll. By
Heaven! I feel my head wobbling on my
shoulders every minute you're in the city. Do
you know, friend, that Michael has had news
from Zenda? He went into a room alone to
read it--and he came out looking like a man
dazed."

"I'm ready," said I, this news making me none
the more eager to linger.

Sapt sat down.

"I must write us an order to leave the city.
Michael's Governor, you know, and we must
be prepared for hindrances. You must sign
the order."

"My dear colonel, I've not been bred a
forger."

Out of his pocket Sapt produced a piece of
paper.

"There's the king's signature, he said, "and
here," he went on, after another search in his
pocket, "is some tracing paper. If you can't
manage a 'Rudolf' in ten minutes, why--I
can."

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

And a very tolerable forgery did this versatile
hero produce.

"Now, Fritz," said he, "the king goes to bed.
He is upset. No one is to see him till nine
o'clock to-morrow. You understand--no one."

"I understand," answered Fritz.

"Michael may come, and claim immediate
audience. You'll answer that only princes of
the blood are entitled to it."

"That'll annoy Michael," laughed Fritz.

"You quite understand?" asked Sapt again. "If
the door of this room is opened while we're
away, you're not to be alive to tell us about
it."

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

"Here, wrap yourself in this big cloak," Sapt
continued to me, "and put on this flat cap. My
orderly rides with me to the shooting-lodge
to-night."

"There's an obstacle," I observed. "The horse
doesn't live that can carry me forty miles."

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

"I'm ready," said I.

Fritz held out his hand.

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

"Damn your sentiment!" growled Sapt.
"Come along."

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

"In the old king's time," said he, "I knew this
way well."

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

"Have your weapon ready," whispered Sapt.
"We must stop his mouth, if he talks."

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

"Please, sir, father's gone to see the king."

"He'd better have stayed here," said Sapt to
me, grinning.

"But he said I wasn't to open the gate, sir."

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

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

"Here's an order from the king. Show it to
your father. Orderly, open the gate!"

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

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

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

"I wonder what the duke's despatches told
him!" said I, once.

"Ay, I wonder?" responded Sapt.

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

"Hark!" he cried.

I listened. Away, far behind us, in the still of
the evening--it was just half-past nine--we
heard the beat of horses' hoofs. The wind
blowing strong behind us, carried the sound.
I glanced at Sapt.

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

"There are two," he said. "They're only a mile
behind. Thank God the road curves in and
out, and the wind's our way."

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

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

"To the right is our road," he said. "To the left,
to the Castle. Each about eight miles. Get
down."

"But they'll be on us!" I cried.

"Get down!" he repeated, brusquely; and I
obeyed.

The wood was dense up to the very edge of
the road. We led our horses into the covert,
bound handkerchiefs over their eyes, and
stood beside them.

"You want to see who they are?" I whispered.

"Ay, and where they're going," he answered.

I saw that his revolver was in his hand.

Nearer and nearer came the hoofs. The moon
shone out now clear and full, so that the road
was white with it. The ground was hard, and
we had left no traces.

"Here they come!" whispered Sapt.

"It's the duke!"

"I thought so!" he answered.

It was the duke; and with him a burly fellow
whom I knew well, and who had cause to
know me afterwards--Max Holf, brother to
Johann the keeper, and body-servant to his
Highness.

They were up to us: the duke reined up. I saw
Sapt's finger curl lovingly towards the trigger.
I believe he would have given ten years of his
life for a shot; and he could have  picked off
Black Michael as easily as I could a barn-door
fowl in a farmyard. I laid my hand on his
arm. He nodded reassuringly: he was always
ready to sacrifice inclination to duty.

"Which way?" asked Black Michael.

"To the Castle, your Highness," urged his
companion. "There we shall learn the truth."

For an instant the duke hesitated.

"I thought I heard hoofs," said he.

"I think not, your Highness."

"Why shouldn't we go to the lodge?"

"I fear a trap. If all is well, why go to the
lodge? If not, it's a snare to trap us."

Suddenly the duke's horse neighed. In an
instant we folded our cloaks close round our
horses' heads, and, holding them thus,
covered the duke and his attendant with our
revolvers. If they had found us, they had
been dead men, or our prisoners.

Michael waited a moment longer. Then he
cried:

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

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

For ten minutes we stayed where we were.

"You see," said Sapt, "they've sent him news
that all is well."

"What does that mean?" I asked.

"God knows," said Sapt, frowning heavily.
"But it's brought him from Strelsau in a rare
puzzle."

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

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

"Look there!" he said, pointing to the ground.

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

"They're what I tied the old woman up with,"
said he. "Fasten the horses, and come along."

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

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

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

"They found the old woman," said I.

"You might have known that from the
handkerchiefs," he said. Then we came
opposite the door of the wine-cellar. It was
shut. It looked in all respects as it had looked
when we left it that morning.

"Come, it's all right," said I.

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

"Where's Josef?" muttered Sapt.

"Where's the king?" I responded.

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

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

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

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

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

"The king? My God! the king?" he whispered
hoarsely.

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

"The king is not here," said I.

CHAPTER VII HIS MAJESTY SLEEPS IN
STRELSAU

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

"They've got the king!"

"Yes," said I, " 'all's well!' as Black Michael's
despatch said. What a moment it must have
been for him when the royal salutes fired at
Strelsau this morning! I wonder when he got
the message!"

"It must have been sent in the morning," said
Sapt. "They must have sent it before news of
your arrival at Strelsau reached Zenda--I
suppose it came from Zenda."

"And he's carried it about all day!" I
exclaimed. "Upon my honour, I'm not the
only man who's had a trying day! What did
he think, Sapt?"

"What does that matter? What does he think,
lad, now?"

I rose to my feet.

"We must get back," I said, "and rouse every
soldier in Strelsau. We ought to be in pursuit
of Michael before mid-day."

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

"The king may be murdered while we sit
here!" I urged.

Sapt smoked on for a moment in silence.

"That cursed old woman!" he broke out. "She
must have attracted their attention somehow.
I see the game. They came up to kidnap the
king, and--as I say--somehow they found
him. If you hadn't gone to Strelsau, you and I
and Fritz had been in heaven by now!"

"And the king?"

"Who knows where the king is now?", he
asked.

"Come, let's be off!" said I; but he sat still.
And suddenly he burst into one of his grating
chuckles:

"By Jove, we've shaken up Black Michael?"

"Come, come!" I repeated impatiently.

"And we'll shake him up a bit more," he
added, a cunning smile broadening on his
wrinkled, weather-beaten face and his teeth
working on an end of his grizzled moustache.
"Ay, lad, we'll go back to Strelsau. The king
shall be in his capital again to-morrow."

"The king?"

"The crowned king!"

"You're mad!" I cried.

"If we go back and tell the trick we played,
what would you give for our lives?"

"Just what they're worth," said I.

"And for the king's throne? Do you think that
the nobles and the people will enjoy being
fooled as you've fooled them? Do you think
they'll love a king who was too drunk to be
crowned and sent a servant to personate
him?"

"He was drugged--and I'm no servant."

"Mine will be Black Michael's version."

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

"Lad," he said, "If you play the man, you may
save the king yet. Go back and keep his
throne warm for him."

"But the duke knows--the villains he has
employed know --"

"Ay, but they can't speak?" roared Sapt, in
grim triumph. "We've got 'em! How can they
denounce you without denouncing
themselves? 'This is not the king, because we
kidnapped the king and murdered his
servant.' Can they say that?"

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

"I must be found out," I urged.

"Perhaps; but every hour's something. Above
all, we must have a king in Strelsau, or the
city will be Michael's in four-and-twenty
hours, and what would the king's life be
worth then--or his throne? Lad, you must do
it!"

"Suppose they kill the king?"

"They'll kill him, if you don't."

"Sapt, suppose they have killed the king?"

"Then, by heaven, you're as good an Elphberg
as Black Michael, and you shall reign in
Ruritania! But I don't believe they have; nor
will they kill him if you're on the throne. Will
they kill him, to put you in?"

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

"I shall be found out," I said.

"Perhaps," said Sapt. "Come! to Strelsau! We
shall be caught like rats in a trap if we stay
here."

"Sapt," I cried, "I'll try it"

"Well played!" said he. "I hope they've left us
the horses. I'll go and see."

"We must bury that poor fellow," said I.

"No time," said Sapt.

"I'll do it."

"Hang you!" he grinned. "I make you a king,
and Well, do it. Go and fetch him, while I
look to the horses. He can't lie very deep, but
I doubt if he'll care about that, Poor little
Josef! He was an honest bit of a man."

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

"The horses are all right; there's the own
brother to the one that brought you here. But
you may save yourself that job."

"I'll not go before he's buried."

"Yes, you will."

"Not I, Colonel Sapt; not for all Ruritania."

"You fool!" said he. "Come here."

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

"They'll save you the trouble," said Sapt.
"Come along."

He was right. The approaching party must,
beyond doubt, be Duke Michael's men, come
to remove the traces of their evil work. I
hesitated no longer, but an irresistible desire
seized me. Pointing to the corpse of poor
little Josef, I said to Sapt:

"Colonel, we ought to strike a blow for him!"

"You'd like to give him some company, eh?
But it's too risky work, your Majesty."

"I must have a slap at 'em," said I.

Sapt wavered.

"Well," said he, "It's not business, you know;
but you've been a good boy--and if we come
to grief, why, hang me, it'll save us a lot of
thinking! I'll show you how to touch them."

He cautiously closed the open chink of the
door. Then we retreated through the house
and made our way to the back entrance. Here
our horses were standing. A carriage-drive
swept all round the lodge.

"Revolver ready?" asked Sapt.

"No; steel for me," said I.

"Gad, you're thirsty to-night," chuckled Sapt.
"So be it."

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

"Now then, fetch him out?'

"Now!" whispered Sapt.

Driving the spurs into our horses, we rushed
at a gallop round the house, and in a moment
we were among the ruffians. Sapt told me
afterwards that he killed a man, and I believe
him; but I saw no more of him. With a cut, I
split the head of a fellow on a brown horse,
and he fell to the ground. Then I found
myself opposite a big man, and I was
half-conscious of another to my right. It was
too warm to stay, and with a simultaneous
action I drove my spurs into my horse again
and my sword full into the big man's breast.
His bullet whizzed past my ear--I could
almost swear it touched it. I wrenched at the
sword, but it would not come, and I dropped
it and galloped after Sapt, whom I now saw
about twenty yards ahead. I waved my hand
in farewell, and dropped it a second later
with a yell, for a bullet had grazed my finger
and I felt the blood. Old Sapt turned round in
the saddle. Someone fired again, but they
had no rifles, and we were out of range. Sapt
fell to laughing.

"That's one to me and two to you, with decent
luck," said he. "Little Josef will have
company."

"Ay, they'll be a  _i_ partie carre'e _i_ ," said I.
My blood was up, and I rejoiced to have
killed them.

"Well, a pleasant night's work to the rest!"
said he. "I wonder if they noticed you!"

"The big fellow did; as I stuck him I heard
him cry, 'The king!' "

"Good! good! Oh, we'll give Black Michael
some work before we've done!"

Pausing an instant, we made a bandage for
my wounded finger, which was bleeding
freely and ached severely, the bone being
much bruised. Then we rode on, asking of
our good horses all that was in them. The
excitement of the fight and of our great
resolve died away, and we rode in gloomy
silence. Day broke clear and cold. We found a
farmer just up, and made him give us
sustenance for ourselves and our horses. I,
feigning a toothache, muffled my face
closely. Then ahead again, till Strelsau lay
before us. It was eight o'clock or nearing nine,
and the gates were all open, as they always
were save when the duke's caprice or
intrigues shut them. We rode in by the same
way as we had come out the evening before,
all four of us--the men and the
horses--wearied and jaded. The streets were
even quieter than when we had gone:
everyone was sleeping off last night's revelry,
and we met hardly a soul till we reached the
little gate of the Palace. There Sapt's old
groom was waiting for us.

"Is all well, sir?" he asked.

"All's well," said Sapt, and the man, coming
to me, took my hand to kiss.

"The king's hurt!" he cried.

"It's nothing," said I, as I dismounted; "I
caught my finger in the door."

"Remember--silence!" said Sapt. "Ah! but, my
good Freyler, I do not need to tell you that!"

The old fellow shrugged his shoulders.

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

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

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

"Thank God, sire! thank God, you're safe!" he
cried, stretching his hand up to catch hold of
mine.

I confess that I was moved. This king,
whatever his faults, made people love him.
For a moment I could not bear to speak or
break the poor fellow's illusion. But tough old
Sapt had no such feeling. He slapped his
hand on his thigh delightedly.

"Bravo, lad!" cried he. "We shall do!"

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

"You're wounded, sire!" he exclaimed.

"It's only a scratch," said I, "but--" I paused.

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

"Where's the king? Where's the king?" he
cried.

"Hush, you fool!" hissed Sapt. "Not so loud!
Here's the king!"

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

"Here, quick, to the bedroom! Off with your
cap and your boots. Get into bed. Cover
everything up."

I did as I was bid. A moment later Sapt
looked in, nodded, grinned, and introduced
an extremely smart and deferential young
gentleman, who came up to my bedside,
bowing again and again, and informed me
that he was of the household of the Princess
Flavia, and that her Royal Highness had sent
him especially to inquire how the king's
health was after the fatigues which his
Majesty had undergone yesterday.

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

"The king," added old Sapt (who, I began to
find, loved a good lie for its own sake), "has
slept without a break all night."

The young gentleman (he reminded me of
"Osric" in Hamlet) bowed himself out again.
The farce was over, and Fritz von
Tarlenheim's pale face recalled us to reality,--
though, in faith, the farce had to be reality for
us now.

"Is the king dead?" he whispered.

"Please God, no," said I. "But he's in the
hands of Black Michael!"

CHAPTER VIII A FAIR COUSIN AND A
DARK BROTHER

A REAL king's life is perhaps a hard one; but
a pretended king's is, I warrant, much harder.
On the next day, Sapt instructed me in my
duties--what I ought to do and what I  ought
to know--for three hours; then I snatched
breakfast, with Sapt still opposite me, telling
me that the king always took white wine in
the morning and was known to detest all
highly seasoned dishes. Then came the
Chancellor, for another three hours; and to
him I had to explain that the hurt to my
finger (we turned that bullet to happy
account) prevented me from writing--whence
arose great to-do, hunting of precedents and
so forth, ending in my "making my mark,"
and the Chancellor  attesting it with a
superfluity of solemn oaths. Then the French
ambassador was introduced, to present his
credentials; here my ignorance was of no
importance, as the king would have been
equally raw to the business (we worked
through the whole _i_ corps diplomatique _i_
in the next few days, a demise of the Crown
necessitating all this pother).

Then, at last, I was left alone. I called my new
servant (we had chosen, to succeed poor
Josef, a young man who had never known
the king), had a brandy-and-soda brought to
me, and observed to Sapt that I trusted that I
might now have a rest.

Fritz von Tarlenheim was standing by.

"By Heaven!" he cried, "we waste time. Aren't
we going to throw Black Michael by the
heels?"

"Gently, my son, gently," said Sapt, knitting
his brows. "It would be a pleasure, but it
might cost us dear. Would Michael fall and
leave the king alive?"

"And," I suggested, "while the king is here in
Strelsau, on his throne, what grievance has he
against his dear brother Michael?"

"Are we to do nothing, then?"

"We're to do nothing stupid," growled Sapt.

"In fact, Fritz," said I, "I am reminded of a
situation in one of our English plays--The
Critic--have you heard of it? Or, if you like, of
two men, each covering the other with a
revolver. For I can't expose Michael without
exposing myself"

"And the king," put in Sapt.

"And, hang me if Michael won't expose
himself, if he tries to expose me!"

"It's very pretty," said old Sapt.

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

"He'll kill the king," said Fritz.

"Not he," said Sapt.

"Half of the Six are in Strelsau," said Fritz.

"Only half? You're sure?" asked Sapt eagerly.

"Yes---only half."

"Then the king's alive, for the other three are
guarding him!" cried Sapt.

"Yes--you're right!" exclaimed Fritz, his face
brightening. "If the king were dead and
buried, they'd all be here with Michael. You
know Michael's back, colonel?"

"I know, curse him!"

"Gentlemen, gentlemen," said I, "who are the
Six?"

"I think you'll make their acquaintance soon,"
said Sapt. "They are six gentlemen whom
Michael maintains in his household: they
belong to him body and soul. There are three
Ruritanians; then there's a Frenchman, a
Belgian, and one of your countrymen."

"They'd all cut a throat if Michael told them,"
said Fritz.

"Perhaps they'll cut mine," I suggested.

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

"De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard."

"The foreigners! It's as plain as a pikestaff.
He's brought them, and left the Ruritanians
with the king: that's because he wants to
commit the Ruritanians as deep as he can."

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

"I wish they had been," said Sapt, wistfully.
"They had been, not Six, but Four, by now."

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

Yet an open conflict was not what I hoped
for.

The king's interest demanded secrecy; and
while secrecy lasted, I had a fine game to play
in Strelsau. Michael should not grow stronger
for delay!

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

Etiquette seconded Fritz's hopes. While I was
ushered into the princess's room, he
remained with the countess in the
antechamber: in spite of the people and
servants who were hanging about, I doubt
not that they managed a  _i_ te^te-a`-te^te
_i_ ; but I had no leisure to think of them, for
I was playing the most delicate move in all
my  difficult game. I had to keep the princess
devoted to me--and yet indifferent to me: I
had to show affection for her--and not feel it.
I had to make love for another, and that to a
girl who--princess or no princess--was the
most beautiful I had ever seen. Well, I braced
myself to the task, made no easier by the
charming embarrassment with which I was
received. How I succeeded in carrying out my
programme will appear hereafter.

"You are gaining golden laurels," she said.
"You are like the prince in Shakespeare who
was transformed by becoming king. But I'm
forgetting you are king, sire."

"I ask you to speak nothing but what your
heart tells you--and to call me nothing but my
name."

She looked at me for a moment.

"Then I'm glad and proud, Rudolf," said she.
"Why, as I told you, your very face is
changed."

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

"My brother is back, I hear. He made an
excursion, didn't he?"

"Yes, he is here," she said, frowning a little.

"He can't stay long from Strelsau, it seems," I
observed, smiling. "Well, we are all glad to
see him. The nearer he is, the better."

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

"Why, cousin? Is it that you can--?"

"See better what he's doing? Perhaps," said I.
"And why are you glad?"

"I didn't say I was glad," she answered.

"Some people say so for you."

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

"Possibly you mean that I am one?"

"Your Majesty could not be," she said,
curtseying in reigned deference, but adding,
mischievously, after a pause: "Unless, that is
--"

"Well, unless what?"

"Unless you tell me that I mind a snap of my
fingers where the Duke of Strelsau is."

Really, I wished that I had been the king.

"You don't care where cousin Michael--"

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

"You call him Michael when you meet him?"

"Yes--by the orders of your father."

"I see. And now by mine?"

"If those are your orders."

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

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

"The Six?"

"You call them that, too?"

"To be in the fashion, I do. But I order you to
receive no one unless you like."

"Except yourself?"

"I pray for myself. I could not order."

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

"It is he!" she cried. "It is--the Duke of
Strelsau!"

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

"Are you wise to make him angry?"

"What? Who? How am I making him angry?"

"Why, by keeping him waiting."

"My dear cousin, I don't want to keep him--"

"Well, then, is he to come in?"

"Of course, if you wish it."

She looked at me curiously.

"How funny you are," she said. "Of course no
one could be announced while I was with
you."

Here was a charming attribute of royalty!

"An excellent etiquette!" I cried. "But I had
clean forgotten it; and if I were alone with
someone else, couldn't you be announced?"

"You know as well as I do. I could be, because
I am of the Blood;" and she still looked
puzzled.

"I never could remember all these silly rules,"
said I, rather feebly, as I inwardly cursed
Fritz for not posting me up. "But I'll repair my
fault."

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

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

"Brother," I said, "If I had known you were
here, you should not have waited a moment
before I asked the princess to permit me to
bring you to her."

He thanked me, but coldly. The man had
many qualities, but he could not hide his
feelings. A mere stranger could have seen
that he hated me, and hated worse to see me
with Princess Flavia; yet I am persuaded that
he tried to conceal both feelings, and, further,
that he tried to persuade me that he believed
I was verily the king. I did not know, of
course; but, unless the king were an
impostor, at once cleverer and more
audacious than I (and I began to think
something of myself in that role), Michael
could not believe that. And, if he didn't, how
he must have loathed paying me deference,
and hearing my "Michael" and my "Flavia"!

"Your hand is hurt, sire," he observed, with
concern.

"Yes; I was playing a game with a mongrel
dog" (I meant to stir him), "and you know,
brother, such have uncertain tempers."

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

"But is there no danger from the bite?" cried
Flavia, anxiously.

"None from this," said I. "If I gave him a
chance to bite deeper, it would be different,
cousin."

"But surely he has been destroyed?" said she.

"Not yet. We're waiting to see if his bite is
harmful."

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

"He'll be knocked on the head, brother," said
I.

"You won't play with him any more?" urged
Flavia.

"Perhaps I shall."

"He might bite again."

"Doubtless he'll try," said I., smiling.

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

"Three friends of mind are very anxious to
have the honour of being presented to you,
sire. They are here in the ante-chamber."

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

"These gentlemen" said Michael, with. a
stately courtesy which, to do him justice, he
could assume with perfect grace and ease,
"are the loyalest and most devoted of your
Majesty's servants, and are my very faithful
and attached friends."

"On the last ground as much as the first," said
I, "I am very pleased to see them."

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

"So Mr. Detchard is in the secret," thought I.

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

"Rudolf," she said, very low, "be careful,
won't you?"

"Of what?"

"You know--I can't say. But think what your
life is to--"

"Well, to--?"

"To Ruritania."

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

"Only to Ruritania?" I asked softly.

A sudden flush spread over her incomparable
face.

"To your friends, too," she said.

"Friends?"

"And to your cousin," she whispered, "and
loving servant."

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

Outside I found Master Fritz, quite reckless
of the footmen, playing at cat's-cradle with
the Countess Helga.

"Hang it!" said he, "we can't always be
plotting. Love claims his share."

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

CHAPTER IX A NEW USE FOR A TEA
TABLE

IF I were to detail the ordinary events of my
daily life at this time, they might prove
instructive to people who are not familiar
with the insides of palaces; if I revealed
some of the secrets I learnt, they might prove
of interest to the statesmen of Europe. I
intend to do neither of these things. I should
be between the Scylla of dulness and the
Charybdis of indiscretion, and I feel that I
had far better confine myself strictly to the
underground drama which was being played
beneath the surface of Ruritanian politics. I
need only say that the secret of my imposture
defied detection. I made mistakes. I had bad
minutes: it needed all the tact and
graciousness whereof I was master to smooth
over some apparent lapses of memory and
unmindfulness of old acquaintances of which
I was guilty. But I escaped, and I attribute my
escape, as I have said before, most of all, to
the very audacity of the enterprise. It is my
belief that, given the necessary physical
likeness, it was far easier to pretend to be
King of Ruritania than it would have been to
personate my next-door neighbour.

One day Sapt came into my room. He threw
me a letter, saying:

"That's for you--a woman's hand, I think. But
I've some news for you first."

"What's that?"

"The king's at the Castle of Zenda," said he.

"How do you know?"

"Because the other half of Michael's Six are
there. I had enquiries made, and they're all
there--Lauengram, Krafstein, and young
Rupert Hentzau; three rogues, too, on my
honour, as fine as live in Ruritania."

"Well?"

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

"And drag the moat?" I asked.

"That would be about it," grinned Sapt; "and
we shouldn't find the king's body then."

"You think it's certain he's there?"

"Very probable. Besides the fact of those
three being there, the drawbridge is kept up,
and no one goes in without an order from
young Hentzau or Black Michael himself. We
must tie Fritz up."

"I'll go to Zenda," said I.

"You're mad."

"Some day."

"Oh, perhaps. You'll very likely stay there
though, if you do."

"That may be, my friend," said I carelessly.

"His Majesty looks sulky," observed Sapt.
"How's the love affair?"

"Damn you, hold your tongue!" I said.

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

"Wherever I go, I'm dodged by half-a-dozen
fellows."

"I know you are; I send 'em," he replied
composedly.

"What for?"

"Well," said Sapt, puffing away, "It wouldn't
be exactly in-convenient for Black Michael if
you disappeared. With you gone, the old
game that we stopped would be played--or
he'd have a shot at it."

"I can take care of myself."

"De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard are in
Strelsau; and any one of them, lad, would cut
your throat as readily--as readily as I would
Black Michael's, and a deal more
treacherously. What's the letter?"

I opened it and read it aloud:

"If the king desires to know what it deeply
concerns the king to know, let him do as this
letter bids him. At the end of the New
Avenue there stands a house in large
grounds. The house has a portico, with a
statue of a nymph on it. A wall encloses the
garden; there is a gate in the wall at the back.
At twelve o'clock to-night, if the king enters
alone by that gate, turns to the right, and
walks twenty yards, he will find a
summer-house, approached by a flight of six
steps. If he mounts and enters, he will find
someone who will tell him what touches most
dearly his life and his throne. This is written
by a faithful friend. He must be alone. If he
neglects the invitation his life will be in
danger. Let him show this to no one, or he
will ruin a woman who loves him: Black
Michael does not pardon."

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

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

"Hallo! there's some more."

"If you hesitate," the writer continued,
"consult Colonel Sapt--"

"Eh!" exclaimed that gentleman, genuinely
astonished. "Does she take me for a greater
fool than you?" I waved to him to be silent.

"Ask him what woman would do most to
prevent the duke from marrying his cousin,
and therefore most to prevent him becoming
king? And ask if her name begins with--A?"

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

"Antoinette de Mauban, by heaven!" I cried.

"How do you know?" asked Sapt.

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

"It's so far true that she's had a great row with
Michael," said he, thoughtfully.

"If she would, she could be useful," I said.

"I believe, though, that Michael wrote that
letter."

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

"No, I shall go," said he.

"You may go as far as the gate."

"I shall go to the summer-house."

"I'm hanged if you shall!"

I rose and leant my back against the
mantelpiece.

"Sapt, I believe in that woman, and I shall
go."

"I don't believe in any woman," said Sapt,
"and you shan't go."

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

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

"We're playing against time," I added. "Every
day we leave the king where he is there is
fresh risk. Every day I masquerade like this,
there is fresh risk. Sapt, we must play high;
we must force the game."

"So be it," he said, with a sigh.

To cut the story short, at half-past eleven that
night Sapt and I mounted our horses. Fritz
was again left on guard, our des-tination not
being revealed to him. It was a very dark
night. I wore no sword, but I carried a
revolver, a long knife, and a bull's-eye
lantern. We arrived outside the gate. I
dismounted. Sapt held out his hand.

"I shall wait here," he said. "If I hear a shot,
I'll--"

"Stay where you are; it's the king's only
chance. You mustn't come to grief too."

"You're right, lad. Good luck!"

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

"Shut the door," she whispered.

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

"Don't talk," she said. "We've no time. Listen!
I know you, Mr. Rassendyll. I wrote that
letter at the duke's orders."

"So I thought," said I.

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

"Three--the three?"

"Yes. You must be gone by then. If not,
to-night you'll be killed--" "Or they will."

"Listen, listen! When you're killed, your body
will be taken to a low quarter of the town. It
will be found there. Michael will at once
arrest all your friends--Colonel Sapt and
Captain von Tarlenheim first,--proclaim a
state of siege in Strelsau, and send a
messenger to Zenda. The other three will
murder the king in the Castle, and the duke
will proclaim either himself or the princess--
himself, if he is strong enough. Anyhow, he'll
marry her, and become king in fact, and soon
in name. Do you see?"

"It's a pretty plot. But why, madame, do
you--?"

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

"And you?" I asked.

"I have my game to play too. If he finds out
what I have done, we shall not meet again. If
not, I may yet--But never mind. Go at once."

"But what will you tell him?"

"That you never came--that you saw through
the trick."

I took her hand and kissed it.

"Madame," said I, "you have served the king
well to-night. Where is he in the Castle?"

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

"Across the drawbridge you come to a heavy
door; behind that lies--Hark! What's that?"

There were steps outside.

"They're coming! They're too soon! Heavens!
they're too soon!" and she turned pale as
death.

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

"Close your lantern. See, there's a chink in
the door. Can you see them?"

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

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

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

"Mr. Rassendyll," it said.

I made no answer.

"We want to talk to you. Will you promise not
to shoot till we've done?"

"Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr.
Detchard?" I said.

"Never mind names."

"Then let mine alone."

"All right,  _i_ sire _i_. I've an offer for you."

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

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

"Don't trust them," whispered Antoinette.

"We can speak through the door," said I.

"But you might open it and fire," objected
Detchard "and though we should finish you,
you might finish one of us. Will you give your
honour not to fire while we talk?"

"Don't trust them," whispered Antoinette
again.

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

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

"That's sensible," he said.

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

"H'm! Private communications," thought I.
Then I said aloud:

"Well, gentlemen, what's the offer?"

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

"No, no," whispered Antoinette in the lowest
of whispers. "They are treacherous."

"That seems handsome," said I, reconnoitring
through the chink. They were all close
together, just outside the door now.

I had probed the hearts of the ruffians, and I
did not need Antoinette's warning. They
meant to "rush" me as soon as I was engaged
in talk.

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

I turned to Antoinette.

"Stand up close to the wall, out of the line of
fire from the door," I whispered.

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

"You'll see," said I,

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

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

"Gentlemen, I accept your offer, relying on
your honour. If you will open the door --"

"Open it yourself," said Detchard.

"It opens outwards," said I. "Stand back a
little, gentlemen, Or I shall hit you when I
open it."

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

"I can't open it!" I cried. "The latch has
caught."

"Tut! I'll open it!" cried Detchard. "Nonsense,
Bersonin, why not? Are you afraid of one
man?"

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

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

"Please God," said I, "she told me the truth
about the ladder!" for the wall was high and
topped with iron spikes.

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

"Come home to bed, old chap. I've got the
finest tea-table story that ever you heard!"

He started and cried:" You're safe? and wrung
my hand. But a moment later he added:

"And what the devil are you laughing at?"

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

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

CHAPTER X A GREAT CHANCE FOR A
VILLAIN

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

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

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

He shook his head with a smile.

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

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

"Then we come to this," pursued Sapt:
"'Madame de Mauban, whose movements
have been watched according to instructions,
left by train at midday. She took a ticket for
Dresden--' "

"It's an old habit of hers," said I.

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

"That is news to me," said I.

"Oh, the preparations are all made!" laughed
Fritz. "I've seen to that."

Sapt turned to me and said, in a sharp,
decisive voice: "You must make love to her
to-night, you know."

"I think it very likely I shall, if I see her
alone," said I.

"Hang it, Sapt, you don't suppose I find it
difficult?"

Fritz whistled a bar or two; then he said:

"You'll find it only too easy. Look here, I hate
telling you this, but I must. The Countess
Helga told me that the princess had become
most attached to the king. Since the
coronation, her feelings have undergone a
marked development. It's quite true that she
is deeply wounded by the king's apparent
neglect."

"Here's a kettle of fish!" I groaned.

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

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

"I think, though," pursued that cold-blooded
old Sapt, "that you'd better make your offer
to-night."

"Good heavens!"

"Or, at any rate, go near it: and I shall send a
'semi-official' to the papers."

"I'll do nothing of the sort--no more will you?
said I. "I utterly refuse to take part in making
a fool of the princess."

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

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

"Oh, damn Michael!" said I. "He'll do
to-morrow. Here, Fritz, come for a stroll in
the garden."

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

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

The little room had French windows opening
on the gardens. The night was fine, cool, and
fragrant. Flavia sat down, and I stood
Opposite her. I was struggling with myself: if
she had not looked at me, I believe that even
then I should have won my fight. But
suddenly, involuntarily, she gave me one
brief glance--a glance of question, hurriedly
turned aside; a blush that the question had
ever come spread over her cheek, and she
caught her breath. Ah, if you had seen her! I
forgot the king in Zenda. I forgot the king in
Strelsau. She was a princess--and I an
impostor. Do you think I remembered that? I
threw myself on my knee and seized her
hands in mine. I said nothing. Why should I?
The soft sounds of the night set my wooing
to a wordless melody, as I pressed my kisses
on her lips.

She pushed me from her, crying suddenly:
"Ah! is it true? or is it only because you
must?"

"It's true!" I said, in low smothered
tones,--"true that I love you more than life--or
truth--or honour!"

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

"Oh, if you were not the king! Then I could
show you how I love you! How is it that I
love you now, Rudolf?"

"Now?"

"Yes--just lately. I--I never did before."

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

"You didn't love me before?" I asked. She
looked up into my face, smiling, as she
whispered:

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

"Never before?" I asked eagerly. She laughed
low.

"You speak as if you would be pleased to
hear me say 'Yes' that," she said.

"Would 'Yes' be true?"

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

"What, Michael? If Michael were the worst--"

"What worse is there?"

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

"If I were not the king," I began, "If I were
only a private gentleman--"

Before I could finish, her hand was in mine.

"If you were a convict in the prison of
Strelsau, you would be my king," she said.

And under my breath I groaned "God forgive
me!" and, holding her hand in mine, I said
again: "If I were not the king---"

"Hush, hush!" she whispered. "I don't deserve
it--I don't deserve to be doubted. Ah, Rudolf!
does a woman who marries without love look
on the man as I look on you?"

And she hid her face from me.

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

"Flavia," I said, in a strange dry voice that
seemed not my own, "I am not--"

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

"A thousand pardons, sire," said he, "but his
Eminence the Cardinal has waited this
quarter of an hour to offer his respect-ful
adieu to your Majesty."

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

"We must not keep his Eminence waiting,"
said I.

But Flavia, in whose love there lay no shame,
with radiant eyes and blushing face, held out
her hand to Sapt. She said nothing, but no
man could have missed her meaning who
had ever seen a woman in the exultation of
love. A sour, yet sad, smile passed over the
old soldier's face, and there was tender-ness
in his voice as, bending to kiss her hand, he
said:

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

He paused and added, glancing at me and
drawing himself up to a military erectness:

"But before all comes the king--God save the
King!"

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

"Amen! Good God, Amen!"

We went into the bail-room again. Forced to
receive adieus, I was separated from Flavia:
everyone, when they left me, went to her.
Sapt was out and in of the throng, and where
he had been, glances, smiles, and whispers
were rife. I doubted not that, true to his
relentless purpose, he was spreading the
news that he had learnt. To uphold the
Crown and beat Black Michael--that was his
one resolve. Flavia, myself--ay, and the real
king in Zenda, were pieces in his game; and
pawns have no business with passions. Not
even at the walls of the Palace did he stop;
for when at last I handed Flavia down the
broad marble steps and into her carriage,
there was a great crowd awaiting us, and we
were welcomed with deafening cheers. What
could I do? Had I spoken then, they would
have refused to believe that I was not the
king; they might have believed that the king
had run mad. By Sapt's devices and my own
ungoverned passion I had been forced on,
and the way back had closed behind me; and
the passion still drove me in the same
direc-tion as the devices seduced me. I faced
all Strelsau that night as the king and the
accepted suitor of the Princess Flavia.

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

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

"That's mine," I said, "not yours--nor the
king's either."

"We struck a good blow for the king to-night."
said he.

I turned on him fiercely.

"What's to prevent me striking a blow for
myself?" I said.

He nodded his head.

"I know what's in your mind," he said. "Yes,
lad; but you're bound in honour."

"Have you left me any honour?"

"Oh, come, to play a little trick on a girl--"

"You can spare me that. Colonel Sapt, if you
would not have me utterly a villain--if you
would not have your king rot in Zenda, while
Michael and I play for the great stake
outside--You follow me?"

"Ay, I follow you."

"We must act, and quickly! You saw
to-night--you heard to-night--"

"I did," said he.

"Your cursed acuteness told you what I
should do. Well, leave me here a week--and
there's another problem for you. Do you find
the answer?"

"Yes, I find it," he answered, frowning
heavily. "But if you did that, you'd have to
fight me first--and kill me."

"Well, and if I had--or a score of men? I tell
you, I could raise all Strelsau on you in an
hour, and choke you with your lies--yes, your
mad lies--in your mouth."

"It's gospel truth," he said,--"thanks to my
advice, you could."

"I could marry the princess, and send Michael
and his brother together to--"

"I'm not denying it, lad," said he.

"Then, in God's name," I cried, stretching out
my hands to him, "let us go to Zenda and
crush this Michael, and bring the king back to
his own again."

The old fellow stood and looked at me for
full a minute.

"And the princess?" he said.

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

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

"Before God, you're the finest Elphberg of
them all. But I have eaten of the king's bread,
and I am the king's servant. Come, we will go
to Zenda!"

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

CHAPTER XI HUNTING A VERY BIG
BOAR

THE terrible temptation which was assailing
me will now be understood. I could so force
Michael's hand that he must kill the king. I
was in a position to bid him defiance and
tighten my grasp on the crown--not for its
own sake, but because the King of Ruritania
was to wed the Princess Flavia. What of Sapt
and Fritz? Ah! but a man cannot be held to
write down in cold blood the wild and black
thoughts that storm his brain when an
uncontrolled passion has battered a breach
for them. Yet, unless he sets up as a saint, he
need not hate himself for them. He is better
employed, as it humbly seems to me, in
giving thanks that power to resist was
vouchsafed to him, than in fretting over
wicked impulses which come unsought and
extort an unwilling hospitality from the
weakness of our nature.

It was a fine bright morning when I walked,
unattended; to the princess's house, carrying
a nosegay in my hand. Policy made excuses
for love, and every attention that I paid her,
while it riveted my own chains, bound closer
to me the people of the great city, who
worshipped her. I found Fritz's _i_ inamorata,
_i_  the Countess Helga,  gathering blooms in
the garden for her mistress's wear, and
prevailed on her to take mine in their place.
The girl was rosy with happiness, for Fritz, in
his turn, not wasted his evening, and no dark
shadow hung over his wooing, save the
hatred which the Duke of Strelsau was
known to bear him.

"And that," she said, with a mischievous
smile, "your Majesty has made of no
moment. Yes, I will take the flowers; shall I
tell you, sire, what is the first thing the
princess does with them?"

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

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

"Bring the king up, Helga; I'll give him some
coffee."

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

"I don't know who that comes from," she
said. "Read it."

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

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

"Why doesn't it say 'the king'?" asked Flavia,
leaning over my shoulder, so that the ripple
of her hair played on my cheek. "Is it a hoax?"

"As you value life, and more than life, my
queen," I said, "obey it to the very letter. A
regiment shall camp round your house
to-day. See that you do not go out unless well
guarded."

"An order, sire?, she asked, a little rebellious.

"Yes, an order, madame--if you love me."

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

"You know who sent it?" she asked.

"I guess," said I. "It is from a good
friend--and, I fear, an unhappy woman. You
must be ill, Flavia, and unable to go to Zenda.
Make your excuses as cold and formal as you
like."

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

"I'm strong enough for anything, while you
are safe," said I.

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

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

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

I could quite appreciate the remark, but I
said:

"There's something beside love, Marshal.
Love's for the heart; is there nothing my
brother might like for his head?"

"I pray that you wrong him, sire."

"Marshal, I'm leaving Strelsau for a few days.
Every evening I will send a courier to you. If
for three days none comes, you will publish
an order which I will give you, depriving
Duke Michael of the governorship of Strelsau
and appointing you in his place. You will
declare a state of siege. Then you will send
word to Michael that you demand an
audience of the king--You follow me?"

"Ay, sire."

"--In twenty-four hours. If he does not
produce the king" (I laid my hand on his
knee), "then the king is dead, and you will
proclaim the next heir. You know who that
is?"

"The Princess Flavia."

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

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

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

"Marshal," I said, "In days to come, it may
be--I know not--that you will hear strange
things of the man who speaks to you now.
Let him be what he may, and who he may,
what say you of the manner in which he has
borne himself as king in Strel-sau?"

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

"I have known many of the Elphbergs," said
he, "and I have seen you. And, happen what
may, you have borne yourself as a wise king
and a brave man; ay, and you have proved as
cour-teous a gentleman and as gallant a lover
as any that have been of the House."

"Be that my epitaph," said I, "when the time
comes that another sits on the throne of
Ruritania."

"God send a far day, and may I not see it?
said he.

I was much moved, and the Marshal's worn
face twitched. I sat down and wrote my
order.

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

It was, in fact, the first time that I had
ventured to write more than a signature; and
in spite of the pains I had taken to learn the
king's hand, I was not yet perfect in it.

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

"Marshal," said I, with a laugh, "what use are
the guns of Strelsau, if they can't assuage a
little suspicion?"

He smiled grimly, and took the paper.

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

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

"Yes, the duke, and someone else of whom I
have need, and who is at Zenda," I replied.

"I wish I could go with you," he cried, tugging
at his white moustache. "I'd like to strike a
blow for you and your crown."

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

"I will deliver her to you safe and sound,"
said he, "and, failing that, I will make her
queen."

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

"It's hard for you. Don't think I don't trust
you; I know you have nothing but true
thoughts in your heart."

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

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

Our plans were now all made, even as we
proceeded to carry them out, and as they will
hereafter appear. The next morning we were
to start on the hunting excursion. I had made
all arrangements for being absent, and now
there was only one thing left to do--the
hardest, the most heart-breaking. As evening
fell, I drove through the busy streets to
Flavia's residence. I was recognised as I went
and heartily cheered. I played my part, and
made shift to look the happy lover. In spite
of my depression, I was almost amused at the
coolness and delicate hauteur with which my
sweet lover received me. She had heard that
the king was leaving Strelsau on a hunting
expedition.

"I regret that we cannot amuse your Majesty
here in Strel-sau," she said, tapping her foot
lightly on the floor. "I would have offered
you more entertainment, but I was foolish
enough to think--"

"Well, what?" I asked, leaning over her.

"That for just a day or two, after--after last
night--you might be happy without much
gaiety;" and she turned pettishly from me, as
she added, "I hope the boars will be more
en-grossing."

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

"Are you offended with me?" I asked, in
feigned surprise, for I could not resist
tormenting her a little. I had never seen her
angry, and every fresh aspect of her was a
delight to me.

"What right have I to be offended? True, you
said last night that every hour away from me
was wasted. But a very big boar! that's a
different thing."

"Perhaps the boar will hunt me," I suggested.
"Perhaps, Flavia, he'll catch me."

She made no answer.

"You are not touched even by that danger?"

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

"You weep for my danger?" Then she spoke
very low:

"This is like what you used to be; but not like
the king--the king I--I have come to love!"

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

"My darling!" I cried, forgetting everything
but her, "did you dream that I left you to go
hunting?"

"What then, Rudolf? Ah! you're not going--?"

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

She had turned very pale.

"So you see, sweet, I was not so poor a lover
as you thought me. I shall not be long gone."

"You will write to me, Rudolf?"

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

"I'll send you all my heart every day," said I.
"And you'll run no danger?"

"None that I need not."

"And when will you be back? Ah, how long it
will be?"

"When shall I be back?" I repeated.

"Yes, yes! Don't be long, dear, don't be long. I
shan't sleep while you're away."

"I don't know when I shall be back," said I.

"Soon, Rudolf, soon?"

"God knows, my darling. But, if never--"

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

"If never," I whispered, "you must take my
place; you'll be the only one of the House
then. You must reign, and not weep for me."

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

"Yes, I will!" she said. "I will reign. I will do
my part, though all my life will be empty and
my heart dead; yet I'll do it!"

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

"Come soon! come soon!"

Carried away, I cried loudly: "As God lives,
I--yes, I myself--will see you once more
before I die!"

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

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

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

She clung to me, a little comforted.

"You won't let Michael hurt you?"

"No, sweetheart."

"Or keep you from me?"

"No, sweetheart."

"Nor anyone else?"

And again I answered:

"No, sweetheart."

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

CHAPTER XII I RECEIVE A VISITOR AND
BAIT A HOOK

About five miles from Zenda--on the
opposite side from that on which the Castle is
situated, there lies a large tract of wood. It is
rising ground, and in the centre of the
demesne, on the top of the hill, stands a fine
modern  _i_ cha^teau _i_ , the property of a
distant kinsman of Fritz's, the Count
Stanislas von Tarlenheim. Count Stanislas
himself was a student and a recluse. he
seldom visited the house, and had, on Fritz's
request, very readily and courteously offered
me its hospitality for myself and my party.
This, then, was our destination; chosen
ostensibly for the sake of the boar-hunting
(for the wood was carefully preserved, and
boars, once common all over Ruritania, were
still to be found there in considerable
numbers), really because it brought us within
striking distance of the Duke of Strelsau's
more magnificent dwelling on the other side
of the town. A large party of servants, with
horses and luggage, started early in the
morning: we followed at midday, travelling
by train for thirt miles, and then mounting
our horses to ride the remaining distance to
the  _i_ cha^teau _i_.

We were a gallant party. Besides Sapt and
Fritz, I was accompanied by ten gentlemen:
every one of them had been carefully chosen
and no less carefully sounded, by my two
friends, and all were devotedly attached to
the person of the king. They were told a part
of the truth: the attempt on my life in the
summer-house was revealed to them, as a
spur to their loyalty and an incitement
against Michael. They were also informed
that a friend of the king's was suspected to be
forcibly confined within the Castle of  Zenda.
His rescue was one of the objects of the
expedition but, it was added, the king's main
desire was to into carry into effect certain
steps against his treacherous brother,  as
tothe precise nature of which they could not
at present be when occasion arose to call for
it. Young, well-bred, brave, and loyal, they
asked no more: they were ready to  prove
their dutiful obedience, and prayed for a
fight as the best and most exhilarating mode
of showing it.

Thus the scene was shifted from Strelsau to
the  _i_ cha^teau _i_  of Tarlenheim and
Castle of Zenda, which frowned at us across
the valley. I tried to shift my thoughts also, to
forget my love, and to bend all my energies
to the task before me. It was to get the king
out of the Castle alive. Force was useless: in
some trick lay the chance; and I had already
an inkling of what we must do. But I was
terribly hampered by the publicity which
attended my movements. Michael must
know by now of my expedition; and I knew
Michael too well to suppose that his eyes
would be blinded by the feint of the
boar-hunt. He would understand very well
what the real quarry was. That, however,
must be risked--that and all it might mean;
for Sapt, no less than myself, recognised that
the present state of things had become
unendurable. And there was one thing that I
dared to calculate on--not, as I now know,
without warrant. It was this --that Black
Michael would not believe that I meant well
by the king. He could not appreciate--I will
not say an honest man, for the thoughts of
my own heart have been revealed--but a man
acting honestly. He saw my opportunity as I
had seen it, as Sapt had seen it; he knew the
princess--nay (and I declare that a sneaking
sort of pity for him invaded me), in his way
he loved her; he would think that Sapt and
Fritz could be bribed, so the bribe were large
enough. Thinking thus, would he kill the
king, my rival and my danger? Ay, verily,
that he would, with as little compunction as
he would kill a rat. But he would kill Rudolf
Rassendyll first, if he could; and nothing but
the certainty of being utterly damned by the
release of the king alive and his restoration to
the throne would drive him to throw away
the trump card which he held in reserve to
baulk the supposed game of the impudent
im-postor Rassendyll. Musing on all this as I
rode along, I took courage.

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

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

"He is able to attend to his affairs, sire."

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

Lauengram and Krafstein looked glum and
uneasy, but young Rupert's smile grew
broader.

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

And I burst out laughing, for I knew what
medicine Detchard longed for--it is called
Revenge.

"You will dine with us, gentlemen?" I asked.

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

"Then," said I, with a wave of my hand, "to
our next meeting, gentlemen. May it make us
better acquainted."

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

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

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

"Fritz," said I, as we entered the town,
"there's an uncommonly pretty girl at this
inn."

"How do you know?" he asked.

"Because I've been there," said I.

"Since--?", he began.

"No. Before," said I.

"But they'll recognise you?"

"Well, of course they will. Now, don't argue,
my good fellow, but listen to me. We're two
gentlemen of the king's household, and one
of us has a toothache. The other will order a
private room and dinner, and, further, a
bottle of the best wine for the sufferer. And if
he be as clever a fellow as I take him for, the
pretty girl and no other will wait on us."

"What if she won't?" objected Fritz.

"My dear Fritz," said I, "If she won't for you,
she will for me."

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

"She's coming," he said.

"If she were not, I should have to doubt the
Countess Helga's taste."

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

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

"The gentleman is no worse than when he
saw you last," said I, throwing away my
cloak.

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

"It was the king, then! I told mother so the
moment I saw his picture. Oh, sir, forgive
me!"

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

"But the things we said!"

"I forgive them for the thing you did."

"I must go and tell mother."

"Stop," said I, assuming a graver air. "We are
not here for sport to-night. Go and bring
dinner, and not a word of the king being
here."

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

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

"Oh, that fellow, sir--my lord king, I mean?"

"'Sir' will do, please. How is he?'

"We hardly see him now, sir."

"And why not?"

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

"So he sulks and stays away?"

"Yes, sir."

"But you could bring him back?" I suggested,
with a smile.

"Perhaps I could," said she.

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

"It's not only that, sir, that keeps him away.
He's very busy at the Castle."

"But there's no shooting on now."

"No, sir; but he's in charge of the house."

"Johann turned housemaid?"

The little girl was brimming over with gossip.

"Well, there are no others," said she. "There's
not a woman there--not as a servant, I mean.
They do say--but perhaps it's false, sir."

"Let's have it for what it's worth," said I.

"Indeed, I'm ashamed to tell you, sir."

"Oh, see, I'm looking at the ceiling."

"They do say there is a lady there, sir; hut,
except for her, there's not a woman in the
place. And Johann has to wait on the
gentlemen."

"Poor Johann! He must be overworked. Yet
I'm sure he could find half-an-hour to come
and see you."

"It would depend on the time, sir, perhaps."

"Do you love him?" I asked.

"Not I, sir."

"And you wish to serve the king?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then tell him to meet you at the second
milestone out of Zenda to-morrow evening at
ten o'clock. Say you'll be there and will walk
home with him."

"Do you mean him harm, sir?"

"Not if he will do as I bid him. But I think
I've told you enough, my pretty maid. See
that you do as I bid you. And, mind, no one is
to know that the king has been here."

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

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

"You want to catch this fellow Johann?" asked
Fritz.

"Ay, and I fancy I've baited the hook right.
Our little Delilah will bring our Samson. It is
not enough, Fritz, to have no women in a
house, though brother Michael shows some
wisdom there. If you want safety, you must
have none within fifty miles."

"None nearer than Strelsau, for instance,"
said poor Fritz, with a lovelorn sigh.

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

"Thank God, you're safe!" he cried. "Have you
seen anything of them?"

"Of whom?" I asked, dismounting.

He drew us aside, that the grooms might not
hear.

"Lad," he said to me, "you must not ride
about here, unless with half-a-dozen of us.
You know among our men a tall young
fellow, Bernenstein by name?"

I knew him. He was a fine strapping young
man, almost of my height, and of light
complexion.

"He lies in his room upstairs, with a bullet
through his arm."

"The deuce he does!,

"After dinner he strolled out alone, and went
a mile or so into the wood; and as he walked,
he thought he saw three men among the
trees; and one levelled a gun at him. He had
no weapon, and he started at a run back
towards the house. But one of them fired,
and he was hit, and had much ado to reach
here before he fainted. By good luck, they
feared to pursue him nearer the house."

He paused, and added:

"Lad, the bullet was meant for you."

"It is very likely," said I, "and it's first blood
to brother Michael."

"I wonder which three it was," said Fritz.

"Well, Sapt," I said, "I went out to-night for
no idle purpose, as you shall hear. But there's
one thing in my mind."

"What's that?, he asked.

"Why this," I answered. "That I shall ill
requite the very great honours Ruritania has
done me if I depart from it, leaving one of
those Six alive--neither, with the help of
God, will I."

And Sapt shook my hand on that.

CHAPTER XIII AN IMPROVEMENT ON
JACOB'S LADDER

IN the morning of the day after that on which
I swore my oath against the Six, I gave certain
orders, and then rested in greater
contentment than I had known for some
time. I was at work; and work, though it
cannot cure love, is yet a narcotic to it; so that
Sapt, who grew feverish, marvelled to see me
sprawling in an arm-chair in the  sunshine,
listening to one of my friends who sang me
amorous songs in a mellow voice and induced
in me a pleasing melancholy. Thus was I
engaged when young Rupert Hentzau, who
feared neither man nor devil, and rode
through the demesne--where every tree
might hide a marksman, for all he knew--as
though it had been the park at Strelsau,
cantered up to where I lay, bowing with
bur-lesque deference, and craving private
speech with me in order to deliver a message
from the Duke of Strelsau. I made all
withdraw, and then he said, seating himself
by me:

"The king is in love, it seems?"

"Not with life, my lord," said I, smiling.

"It is well," he rejoined.

"Come, we are alone. Rassendyll!"

I rose to a sitting posture.

"What's the matter?" he asked.

"I was about to call one of my gentlemen to
bring your horse, my lord. If you do not
know how to address the king, my brother
must find another messenger."

"Why keep up the farce?" he asked,
negligently dusting his boot with his glove.

"Because it is not finished yet; and
meanwhile I'llchoose my own name."

"Oh, so be it! Yet I spoke in love for you; for
indeed you are a man after my own heart."

"Saving my poor honesty," said I, "maybe I
am. But that I keep faith with men, and
honour with women, maybe I am, my lord."

He darted a glance at me--a glance of anger.

"Is your mother dead?" said I.

"Ay, she's dead."

"She may thank God," said I, and I heard him
curse me softly.

"Well, what's the message?" I continued.

I had touched him on the raw, for all the
world knew he had broken his mother's heart
and flaunted his mistresses in her house; and
his airy manner was gone for the  moment.

"The duke offers you more than I would," he
growled. "A halter for you, sire, was my
suggestion. But he offers you safe-conduct
across the frontier and a million crowns."

"I prefer your offer, my lord, if I am bound to
one."

"You refuse?"

"Of course."

"I told Michael you would;" and the villain,
his temper restored, gave me the sunniest of
smiles. "The fact is, between ourselves," he
continued. "Michael doesn't understand a
gentleman."

I began to laugh.

"And you?" I asked.

"I do," he said. "Well, well, the halter be it."

"I'm not sorry you won't live to see it," I
observed.

"Has his Majesty done me the honour to
fasten a particular quarrel on me?"

"I would you were a few years older, though."

"Oh, God gives years, but the devil gives
increase," laughed he. "l can hold my own."

"How is your prisoner?" I asked.

"The k---?"

"Your prisoner."

"I forgot your wishes, sire. Well, he is alive."

He rose to his feet; I imitated him. Then, with
a smile, he said:

"And the pretty princess? Faith, I'll wager the
next Elphberg will be red enough, for all that
Black Michael will be his father."

I sprang a step towards him, clenching my
hand. He did not move an inch, and his lip
curled in insolent amusement.

"Go, while your skin's whole?" I muttered. He
had repaid me with interest my hit about his
mother.

Then came the most audacious thing I have
known in my life. My friends were some
thirty yards away. Rupert called to a groom to
bring him his horse, and dismissed the fellow
with a crown. The horse stood near. I stood
still, suspecting nothing. Rupert made as
though to mount; then he suddenly turned to
me, his left hand resting in his belt, his right
outstretched:

"Shake hands," he said.

I bowed, and did as he had foreseen--I put
my hands behind me. Quicker than thought,
his left hand darted out at me, and a small
dagger flashed in the air; he struck me in the
left shoulder--had I not swerved, it had been
my heart. With a cry, I staggered back.
Without touching the stirrup, he leapt upon
his horse and was off like an arrow, pursued
by cries and revolver-shots--the last as
useless as the first,--and I sank into my chair,
bleeding profusely, as I watched the devil's
brat disappear down the long avenue. My
'friends surrounded me, and then I fainted.

I suppose that I was put to bed, and there lay,
unconscious, or half-conscious, for many
hours; for it was night when I awoke to my
full mind, and found Fritz beside me. I was
weak and weary, but he bade me be of good
cheer, saying that my wound would soon
heal, and that meanwhile all had gone well,
for Johann, the keeper, had fallen into the
snare we had laid for him, and was even now
in the house.

"And the queer thing is," pursued Fritz, "that
I fancy he's not altogether sorry to find
himself here. He seems to think that when
Black Michael has brought off his coup,
witnesses of how it was effected--saving, of
course, the Six themselves--will not be at a
premium."

This idea argued a shrewdness in our captive
which led me to build hopes on his
assistance. I ordered him to be brought in at
once. Sapt conducted him, and set him in a
chair by my bedside. He was sullen and
afraid; but, to say truth, after young Rupert's
exploit, we also had our fears, and, if he got
as far as possible from Sapt's formidable
six-shooter, Sapt kept him as far as he could
from me. Moreover, when he came in his
hands were bound, but that I would not
suffer.

I need not stay to recount the safeguards and
rewards we promised the fellow--all of which
were honourably observed and paid, so that
he lives now in prosperity (though where I
may not mention); and we were the more
free inasmuch as we soon learnt that he was
rather a weak man than a wicked, and had
acted throughout this matter more from fear
of the duke and of his own brother  Max than
for any love of what was done. But he had
persuaded all of his loyalty; and though not
in their secret counsels, was yet, by his
knowledge of their dispositions within the
Castle, able to lay bare before us the very
heart of their devices. And here, in brief, is
his story:

Below the level of the ground in the Castle,
approached by a flight of stone steps which
abutted on the end of the drawbridge, were
situate two small rooms, cut out of the rock
itself. The outer of the two had no windows,
but was always lighted with candles; the
inner had one square window, which gave
upon the moat. In the outer room there lay
always, day and night, three of the Six; and
the instructions of Duke Michael were, that
on any attack being made on the outer room,
the three were to defend the door of it so
long as they could without risk to
themselves. But, so soon as the door should
be in danger of being forced, then Rupert
Hentzau or Detchard (for one of these two
was always there) should leave the others to
hold it as long as they could, and himself pass
into the inner room, and; without more ado,
kill the king who lay there, well-treated
indeed, but without weapons, and with his
arms confined in fine steel chains, which did
not allow him to move his elbow more than
three inches from his side. Thus, before the
outer door were stormed, the king would be
dead. And his body? For his body would be
evidence as damning as himself.

"Nay, sir," said Johann, "his Highness has
thought of that. While the two hold the outer
room, the one who has killed the king
unlocks the bars in the square window (they
turn on a hinge). The window now gives no
light, for its mouth is choked by a great pipe
of earthenware; and this pipe, which is large
enough to let pass through it the body of a
man, passes into the moat, coming to an end
immediately above the surface of the water,
so that there is no perceptible interval
between water and pipe. The king being
dead, his murderer swiftly ties a weight to
the body, and, dragging it to the window,
raises it by a pulley (for, lest the weight
should prove too great, Detchard has
provided one) till it is level with the mouth.
of the pipe. He inserts the feet in the pipe,
and pushes the body down. Silently, without
splash or sound, it falls into the water and
thence to the bottom of the moat, which is
twenty feet deep thereabouts. This done, the
murderer cries loudly, 'All's well!' and
himself slides down the pipe; and the others,
if they can and the attack is not too hot, run
to the inner room and, seeking a moment's
delay, bar the door, and in their turn slide
down. And though the king rises not from the
bottom, they rise and swim round to the
other side, where the orders are for men to
wait them with ropes, to haul them out, and
horses. And here, if things go ill, the duke
will join them and seek safety by riding; but
if all goes well, they will return to the Castle,
and have their enemies in a trap. That, sir, is
the plan of his Highness for the disposal of
the king in case of need. But it is not to be
used till the last; for, as we all know, he is not
minded to kill the king unless he can, before
or soon after, kill you also, sir. Now, sir, I
have spoken the truth, as God is my witness,
and I pray you to shield me from the
vengeance of Duke Michael; for if, after he
knows what I have done, I fall into his hands,
I shall pray for one thing out of all the
world--a speedy death, and that I shall not
obtain from him!"

The fellow's story was rudely told, but our
questions supple-mented his narrative. What
he had told us applied to an armed attack;
but if suspicions were aroused, and there
came overwhelming force--such, for instance,
as I, the king, could bring --the idea of
resistance would be abandoned; the king
would be quietly murdered and slid down
the pipe. And--here comes an ingenious
touch--one of the Six would take his place in
the cell, and, on the entrance of the searchers,
loudly demand release and  redress; and
Michael, being summoned, would confess to
hasty action, but he would say the man had
angered him by seeking the favour of a lady
in the Castle (this was Antoinette de
Mauban), and he had confined him there, as
he conceived he, as Lord of Zenda, had right
to do. But he was now, on receiving his
apology, content to let him go, and so end the
gossip which, to his Highness's annoyance,
had arisen con-cerning a prisoner in Zenda,
and had given his visitors the trouble of this
inquiry. The visitors, baffled, would retire,
and Michael could, at his leisure, dispose of
the body of the king.

Sapt, Fritz, and I in my bed, looked round on
one another in horror and bewilderment at
the cruelty and cunning of the plan. Whether
I went in peace or in war, openly at the head
of a  _i_ corps _i_ , or secretly by a stealthy
assault, the king would be dead before I
could come near him. If Michael were
stronger and overcame my party, there
would be an end. But if I were stronger, I
should have no way to punish him, no means
of proving any guilt in him without proving
my own guilt also. On the other hand, I
should be left as king (ah! for a moment my
pulse quickened), and it would be for the
future to witness the final struggle between
him and me. He seemed to have  made
triumph possible and ruin impossible. At the
worst, he would stand as well as he had stood
before I crossed his path--with but one man
between him and the throne, and that man
an impostor; at best, there would be none left
to stand against him. I had begun to think
that Black Michael was over fond of leaving
the fighting to his friends; but now I
acknowledged that the brains, if not the
arms, of the conspiracy were his.

"Does the king know this?" I asked.

"I and my brother," answered Johann, "put up
the pipe, under the orders of my Lord of
Hentzau. He was on guard that day, and the
king asked my lord what it meant. 'Faith,' he
answered, with his airy laugh, 'it's a new
improvement on the ladder of Jacob,
whereby, as you have read, sire, men pass
from earth to heaven. We thought it not meet
that your Majesty should go, in case, sire, you
must go, by the common route. So we have
made you a pretty private passage, where the
vulgar cannot stare at you or incommode
your passage. That, sire, is the meaning of
that pipe.' And he 'laughed and bowed, and
prayed the king's leave to replenish the king's
glass--for the king was at supper. And the
king, though he is a brave man, as are all of
his House, grew red and then white as he
looked on the pipe and at the merry devil
who mocked him. Ah, sir" (and the fellow
shuddered), "It is not easy to sleep quiet in
the Castle of Zenda, for all of them would as
soon cut a man's throat as play a game at
cards; and my Lord Rupert would choose it
sooner for a pastime than any other--ay,
sooner than he would ruin a woman, though
that he loves also."

The man ceased, and I bade Fritz take him
away and have him carefully guarded; and,
turning to him, I added:

"If anyone asks you if there is a prisoner in
Zenda, you may answer 'Yes.' But if any asks
who the prisoner is, do not answer. For all my
promises will not save you if any man here
learns from you the truth as to the prisoner in
Zenda. I'll kill you like a dog if the thing be
so much as breathed within the house."

Then, when he was gone, I looked at Sapt.

"It is a hard nut!" said I.

"So hard," said he, shaking his grizzled head,
"that, as I think, this time next year is like to
find you still king of Ruritania" and he broke
out into curses on Michael's cunning.

I lay back on my pillows.

"There seem to me," I observed, "to be two
ways by which the king can come out of
Zenda alive. One is by treachery in the duke's
followers."

"You can leave that out," said Sapt.

"I hope not," I rejoined, "because the other I
was about to mention is by--a miracle from
heaven!

CHAPTER XIV A NIGHT OUTSIDE THE
CASTLE

IT would have surprised the good people of
Ruritania to know of the foregoing talk; for,
according to the official reports, I had
suffered a grievous and dangerous hurt from
an accidental spear-thrust, received in the
course of my sport. I caused the bulletins to
be of a very serious character, and created
great public excitement, whereby three things
occurred: first, I gravely offended the
medical faculty of Strelsau by refusing to
summon to my bedside any of them, save a
young man, a friend of Fritz's, whom we
could trust; secondly, I received word from
Marshal Strakencz that my orders seemed to
have no more weight than his, and that the
Princess Flavia was leaving for Tarlenheim
under his unwilling escort (news whereat I
strove not to be glad and proud); and thirdly,
my brother, the Duke of Strelsau, although
too well informed to believe the account of
the origin of my sickness, was yet persuaded
by the reports and by my seeming inactivity
that I was in truth incapable of action, and
that my life was in some danger. This I learnt
from the man Johann, whom I was compelled
to trust and send back to Zenda,  where, by
the way, Rupert Hentzau had him soundly
flogged for daring to smirch the morals of
Zenda by staying out all night in the pursuits
of love. This, from Rupert, Johann deeply
resented, and the duke's approval of it did
more to bind the keeper to my side than all
my promises.

On Flavia's arrival I cannot dwell. Her joy at
finding me up and well, instead of on my
back and fighting with death, makes a picture
that even now dances before my eyes till they
grow too dim to see it; and her reproaches
that I had not trusted even her, must excuse
the means I took to quiet them. In truth, to
have her with me once more was  like a taste
of heaven to a damned soul, the sweeter for
the inevitable doom that was to follow; and I
rejoiced in being able to waste two whole
days with her. And when I had wasted two
days, the Duke of Strelsau arranged a
hunting-party.

The stroke was near now. For Sapt and I,
after anxious consultations, had resolved that
we must risk a blow, our resolution being
clinched by Johann's news that the king grew
peaked, pale, and ill, and that his health was
breaking down under his rigorous
confinement. Now a man--be he king or no
king--may as well die swiftly and as becomes
a gentleman, from bullet or thrust, as rot his
life out in a cellar! That thought made prompt
action advisable in the interests of the king;
from my own point of view, it grew more and
more necessary. For Strakencz urged on me
the need of a speedy marriage, and my own
inclinations seconded him with such terrible
insistence that I feared for my resolution. I do
not believe that I should have done the deed
I dreamt of; but I might have come to flight,
and my flight would have ruined the cause.
And--yes, I am no saint (ask my little
sister-in-law), and worse still might have
happened.

It is perhaps as strange a thing as has ever
been in the history of a country that the
king's brother and the king's personator, in a
time of profound outward peace, near a
placid undisturbed country town, under
semblance of amity, should wage a desperate
war for the person and life of the king. Yet
such was the struggle that began now
between Zenda and Tarlenheim. When I look
back on the time, I seem to myself to have
been half-mad. Sapt has told me that I
suffered no interference and listened to no
remonstrances; and if ever a King of
Ruritania ruled like a despot, I was, in those
days the man. Look where I would, I saw
nothing that made life sweet to me, and I
took my life in my hand and carried it
carelessly I as a man dangles an old glove. At
first they strove to guard me, to keep me safe,
to persuade me not to expose myself; but
when they saw how I was set, there grew up
among them--whether they knew the truth or
not--a feeling that Fate ruled the issue, and
that I must be left to play my game with
Michael my own way.

Late next night I rose from table, where
Flavia had sat by me, and conducted her to
the door of her apartments. There I kissed
her hand, and bade her sleep sound and
wake to happy days. Then I changed my
clothes and went out. Sapt and Fritz were
waiting for me with six men and the horses.
Over his saddle Sapt carried a long coil of
rope, and both were heavily armed. I had
with me a short stout cudgel and a long knife.
Making a circuit, we avoided the town, and in
an hour found ourselves slowly mounting the
hill that led to the Castle of Zenda. The night
was dark and very stormy; gusts of wind and
spits of rain caught us as we breasted the
incline, and the great trees  moaned and
sighed. When we came to a thick clump,
about a quarter of a mile from the Castle, we
bade our six fiends hide there with the
horses. Sapt had a whistle, and they could
rejoin us in a few moments, if danger came:
but, up till now, we had met no one. I hoped
that Michael was still off his guard, believing
me to be safe in bed. However that might be,
we gained the top of the hill  without
accident, and found ourselves on the edge of
the moat where it sweeps under the road,
separating the old Castle from it. A tree stood
on the of the bank, and Sapt, silently and
diligently, set to make fast the rope. I
stripped off my boots, took a pull at a flask of
brandy, loosened the knife in its sheath, and
took the cudgel my teeth. Then I shook hands
with my friends, not a last look of entreaty
from Fritz, and laid hold of the I was going to
have a look at Jacob's Ladder.

Gently I lowered myself into the water.
Though the night wild, the day had been
warm and bright, and the water not cold. I
struck out, and began to swim round the
great which frowned above me. I could see
only three yards I had then good hopes of not
being seen, as I crept close under the damp,
moss-grown masonry. There were lights from
the new part of the Castle on the other side,
and again I heard laughter and merry shouts.
I fancied I recognised young Rupert
Hentzau's ringing tones, and pictured him
flushed with wine. Recalling my thoughts to
the business in hand, I rested a moment. If
Johann's description were right, I must be
near the window now. Very slowly I moved;
and, out of the darkness ahead,  loomed a
shape. It was the pipe, curving from the
window to the water: about four feet of its
surface were displayed; it was as big round as
two men. I was about to approach it, when I
saw something else, and my heart stood still.
The nose of a boat protruded beyond the
pipe on the other side; and listening intently,
I heard a slight shuffle--as of a man shifting
his position. Who was the man who guarded
Michael's invention P Was he awake or was
he asleep P I felt if my knife were ready, and
trod water; as I did so, I found bottom under
my feet. The foundations of the Castle
extended some fifteen inches, making a
ledge; and I stood on it, out of water from my
armpits upwards. Then I crouched and
peered through the darkness under the pipe,
where, curving, it left a space.

There was a man in the boat. A rifle lay by
him--I saw the gleam of the barrel. Here was
the sentinel! He sat very still. I listened: he
breathed heavily, regularly, monotonously.
By Heaven, he slept! Kneeling on the shelf, I
drew forward under the pipe till my face was
within two feet of his. He was a big man, I
saw. It was Max Holf, the brother of Johann.
My hand stole to my belt, and I drew but my
knife. Of all the deeds of my life, I love the
least to think of this, and whether it were the
act of a man or a traitor I will not ask. I said
to myself: "It is war--and the king's life is the
stake." And I raised myself from beneath the
pipe and stood up by the boat, which lay
moored by the ledge. Holding my breath, I
marked the spot and raised my arm. The
great fellow stirred. He opened his
eyes--wide, wider. He gasped in terror at my
face and clutched at his rifle, I struck home.
And I heard the chorus of a love-song from
the opposite bank.

Leaving him where he lay, a huddled mass, I
turned to "Jacob's Ladder." My time was
short. This fellow's turn of watching might be
over directly, and relief would come.  Leaning
over the pipe, I examined it, from the end
near the water to the topmost extremity
where it passed, or seemed to pass, through
the masonry of the wall. There was no break
in it, no chink. Dropping on my knees, I
tested the under side. And my breath went
quick and fast, for on this lower side, where
the pipe should have clung close to the
masonry, there was a gleam of light! That
light must come from the cell of the king! I
set my shoulder against the pipe and exerted
my strength. The chink widened a very, very
little, and  hastily I desisted; I had done
enough to show that the pipe was not fixed in
the masonry at the lower side.

Then I heard a voice--a harsh, grating voice:

"Well, sire, if you have had enough of my
society, I will leave you to repose; but I must
fasten the little ornaments first."

It was Detchard! I caught the English accent
in a moment.

"Have you anything to ask, sire, before we
part?"

The king's voice followed. It was his, though
it was faint and hollow--different from the
merry tones I had heard in the glades of the
forest.

"Pray my brother," said the king, "to kill me. I
am dying by inches here."

"The duke does not desire your death,
sire--yet," sneered Detchard; "when he does,
behold your path to heaven?

The king answered:

"So be it! And now, if your orders allow it,
pray leave me.

"May you dream of paradise!" said the
ruffian.

The light disappeared. I heard the bolts of the
door run home.

And then I heard the sobs of the king. He
was alone, as he thought. Who dares mock at
him? I did not venture to speak to him. The
risk of some exclamation escaping him in
surprise was too great. I dared do nothing
night; and my task now was to get myself
away in safety, to carry off the carcase of the
dead man. To leave him would tell too much.
Casting loose the boat, I got in. The wind was
blowing a gale now, and there was little
danger 'of oars being heard. I rowed swiftly
round to where my friends waited. I had just
reached the spot, when a loud whistle
sounded over the moat behind me.

"Hullo, Max!" I heard shouted.

I hailed Sapt in a low tone. The rope came
down. I tied it round the corpse, and then
went up it myself.

"Whistle you two," I whispered, "for our men,
and haul in the line. No talk now."

They hauled up the body. Just as it reached
the road, three men on horseback swept
round from the front of the Castle. We saw
them; but, being on foot ourselves, we
escaped their notice. But we heard our men
coming up with a shout.

"The devil, but it's dark!, cried a ringing voice.

It was young Rupert. A moment later, shots
rang out. Our people had met them. I started
forward at a run, Sapt and Fritz following me.

"Thrust, thrust!" cried Rupert again, and a
loud groan following told that he himself was
not behind hand.

"I'm done, Rupert!" cried a voice. "They're
two to one. Save yourself!"

I ran on, holding my cudgel in my hand.
Suddenly a horse came towards me. A man
was on it, leaning over his shoulder.

"Are you cooked too, Krafstein?" he cried.
There was no answer.

I sprang to the horse's head. It was Rupert
Hentzau.

"At last!", I cried.

For we seemed to have him. He had only his
sword in his hand. My men were hot upon
him; Sapt and Fritz were running up. I had
outstripped them; but if they got close
enough to fire, he must die or surrender.

"At last!" I cried.

"It's the play-actor!" cried he, slashing at my
cudgel. He cut it clean in two; and, judging
discretion better than death, I ducked my
head and (I blush to tell it) scampered for my
life. The devil was in Rupert Hentzau; for he
put spurs to his home, and I, turning to look,
saw him ride, full gallop, to the edge of the
moat and leap in, while the shots of our party
fell thick round him like hail. With one
gleam of moonlight we should have riddled
him with balls; but, in the darkness, he won
to the corner of the Castle, and vanished
from our sight.

"The deuce take him!" grinned Sapt.

"It's a pity," said I, "that he's a villain. Whom
have we got?"

We had Lauengram and Krafstein: they lay
dead; and, concealment being no longer
possible, we flung them, with Max, into the
moat; and, drawing together in a compact
body, rode off down the hill. And, in our
midst, went the bodies of three gallant
gentlemen. Thus we travelled home, heavy at
heart for the death of our friends, sore
uneasy concerning the king, and cut to the
quick that young Rupert had played yet
another winning hand with us.

For my own part, I was vexed and angry that
I had killed no man in open fight, but only
stabbed a knave in his sleep. And I did not
love to hear Rupert call me a play-actor.

CHAPTER XV I TALK WITH A TEMPTER

RURITANIA is not England, or the quarrel
between Duke Michael and myself could not
have gone on, with the remarkable incidents
which marked it, without more public notice
being directed to it. Duels were frequent
among all the upper classes, and private
quarrels between great men kept the old
habit of spreading to their friends and
dependants. Never-theless, after the affray
which I have just related, such reports began
to circulate that I felt it necessary to be on my
guard. The death of the gentlemen  involved
could not be hidden from their relatives. I
issued a stern order, declaring that duelling
had attained unprecedented licence (the
Chancellor drew up the  document for me,
and very well he did it), and forbidding it
save in the gravest cases. I sent a public and
stately apology to Michael, and he returned a
deferential and courteous reply to me; for our
one point of union was-- and it underlay all
our differences and induced an unwilling
harmony between our actions--that we could
neither of us afford to throw our cards on the
table. He, as well as I, was a "play-actor," and,
hating one another,  we combined to dupe
public opinion. Unfor-tunately, however, the
necessity for concealment involved the
necessity of delay: the king might die in his
prison, or even be spirited off somewhere
else; it could not be  helped. For a little while
I was compelled to observe a truce, and my
only con-solation was that Flavia most
warmly approved of my edict against
duelling; and, when I expressed delight at
having won her favour, prayed me, if her
favour were any motive to me, to prohibit the
practice altogether.

"Wait till we are married," said I, smiling.

Not the least peculiar result of the truce and
of the secrecy which dictated it was that the
town of Zenda became in the daytime--l
would not have trusted far to its protection
by night--a sort of neutral zone, where both
parties could safely go; and I, riding down
one day with Flavia and Sapt, had an
encounter with an acquaintance, which
presented a ludicrous side, but was at the
same time embarrassing.  As I rode along, I
met a dignified-looking person driving in a
two-horsed carriage. He stopped his horses,
got out, and approached me, bowing low. I
recognised the head of the Strelsau Police.

"Your Majesty's ordinance as to duelling is
receiving our best attention," he assured me.

If the best attention involved his presence in
Zenda, I deter-mined at once to dispense
with it.

"Is that what brings you to Zenda, Prefect?" I
asked.

"Why no, sire; I am here because I desired to
oblige the British Ambassador."

"What's the British Ambassador doing  _i_
dans cette galere _i_ ?" said I, carelessly.

"A young countryman of his, sire--a man of
some position--is missing. His friends have
not heard from him for two months, and
there is reason to believe that he was last
seen in Zenda."

Flavia was paying little attention. I dared not
look at Sapt.

"What reason?"

"A friend of his in Paris--a certain M.
Featherly--has given us information which
makes it possible that he came here, and the
officials of the railway recollect his name on
some luggage."

"What was his name?"

"Rassendyll, sire," he answered; and I saw
that the name meant nothing to him. But,
glancing at Flavia, he lowered his eyes as he
went on: " It is thought that he may have
followed a lady here. Has your Majesty heard
of a certain Madame de Mauban?"

"Why, yes," said I, my eye involuntarily
travelling towards the Castle.

"She arrived in Ruritania about the same
time as this Rassendyll."

I caught the Prefect's glance; he was regarding
me with with inquiry writ large on his face.

"Sapt," said I, "I must speak a word to the
Prefect. Will you ride on a few paces with the
princess?" And I added to the Prefect: "Come,
sir, what do you mean?"

He drew close to me, and I bent in the saddle.

"If he were in love with the lady?" he
whispered. "Nothing has been heard of him
for two months ;" and this time it was the eye
of the Prefect which travelled towards the
Castle.

"Yes, the lady is there," I said quietly. "But I
don't suppose Mr. Rassendyll--is that the
name?--is."

"The duke," he whispered, "does not like
rivals, sire."

"You're right there," said I, with all sincerity.
"But surely you hint at a very grave charge?"

He spread his hands out in apology. I
whispered in his ear:

"This is a grave matter. Go back to Strelsau--
"

"But, sire, if I have a clue here?"

"Go back to Strelsau," I repeated. "Tell the
Ambassador that you have a clue, but that
you must be left alone for a week or two.
Meanwhile, I'll charge myself with looking
into the matter."

"The Ambassador is very pressing, sire."

"You must quiet him. Come, sir; you see that
if your suspicions are correct, it is an affair in
which we must move with caution. We can
have no scandal. Mind you return to-night."

He promised to obey me, and I rode on to
rejoin my companions, a little easier in my
mind. Inquiries after me must be stopped at
all hazards for a week or two; and this clever
official had come surprisingly near the truth.
His impression might be useful some day,
but if he acted on it now it might mean the
worst to the king. Heartily did I curse George
Featherly for not holding his tongue.

"Well," asked Flavia, "have you finished your
business?"

"Most satisfactorily," said I. "Come, shall we
turn round? We are almost trenching on my
brother's territory."

We were, in fact, at the extreme end of the
town, just where the hill begins to mount
towards the Castle. We cast our eyes up,
admiring the massive beauty of the old
walls, and we saw a  _i_ cortege _i_  winding
slowly down the hill. On it came.

"Let us go back," said Sapt.

"I should like to stay," said Flavia; and I
reined my horse beside hers.

We could distinguish the approaching party
now. There came first two mounted servants
in black uniforms, relieved only by a silver
badge. These were followed by a car drawn
by four horses: on it, under a heavy pall, lay a
coffin; behind it rode a man in plain black
clothes, carrying his hat in his hand.

Sapt uncovered, and we stood waiting, Flavia
keeping by me and laying her hand on my
arm.

"It is one of the gentlemen killed in the
quarrel, I expect," she said.

I beckoned to a groom.

"Ride and ask whom they escort," I ordered.

He rode up to the servants, and I saw him
pass on to the who rode behind.

"It's Rupert of Hentzau," whispered Sapt.

Rupert it was, and directly afterwards,
waving to the procession to stand still, Rupert
trotted up to me. He was in a frock-coat,
tightly buttoned, and trousers. He wore an
aspect of sadness, and he bowed with
profound respect. Yet suddenly he smiled,
and I smiled too, for old Sapt's hand lay in
his left breast-pocket and Rupert and I both
guessed what lay in the hand inside the
pocket.

"Your Majesty asks whom we escort," said
Rupert. "It is my dear friend, Albert of
Lauengram."

"Sir," said I, "no one regrets the unfortunate
affair more than I. My ordinance, which I
mean to have obeyed, is witness to it."

"Poor fellow!" said Flavia softly, and I saw
Rupert's eyes flash at her. Whereat I grew
red; for, if I had my way, Rupert Hentzau
should not have defiled her by so much as a
glance. Yet he did it and dared to let
admiration be seen in his look.

"Your Majesty's words are gracious," he said.
"I grieve for my friend. Yet, sire, others must
soon lie as he lies now."

"It is a thing we all do well to remember, my
lord," I rejoined.

"Even kings, sire," said Rupert, in a
moralising tone; and old Sapt swore softly by
my side.

"It is true," said I. "How fares my brother, my
lord?"

"He is better, sire."

"I am rejoiced."

"He hopes soon to leave for Strelsau, when
his health is secured."

"He is only convalescent, then?"

"There remain one or two small troubles,"
answered the insolent fellow, in the mildest
tone in the world.

"Express my earnest hope," said Flavia, "that
they may soon cease to trouble him."

"Your Royal Highness's wish is, humbly, my
own," said Rupert, with a bold glance that
brought a blush to Flavia's cheek.

I bowed; and Rupert, bowing lower, backed
his horse and signed to his party to proceed.
With a sudden impulse, I rode after him. He
turned swiftly, fearing that, even in the
presence of the dead and before a lady's eyes,
I meant him mischief.

"You fought as a brave man the other night," I
said. "Come, you are young, sir. If you will
deliver your prisoner alive to me, you shall
come to no hurt."

He looked at me with a mocking smile; but
suddenly he rode nearer to me.

"I'm unarmed," he said; "and our old Sapt
there could pick me off in a minute."

"I'm not afraid," said I.

"No, curse you!" he answered. "Look here, I
made you a proposal from the duke once."

"I'll hear nothing from Black Michael," said I.

"Then hear one from me." He lowered his
voice to a whisper. "Attack the Castle boldly.
Let Sapt and Tarlenheim lead."

"Go on," said I.

"Arrange the time with me."

"I have such confidence in you, my lord!"

"Tut! I'm talking business now. Sapt there
and Fritz will fall; Black Michael will fall."

"What!"

"--Black Michael will fall, like the dog he is;
the prisoner, as you call him, will go by
Jacob's Ladder--ah, you know that!---to hell!
Two men will be left--I, Rupert Hentzau, and
you, the King of Ruritania."

He paused, and then, in a voice that quivered
with eagerness, added:

"Isn't that a hand to play?--a throne and your
princess! And for me, say a competence and
your Majesty's gratitude."

"Surely," I exclaimed, "while you're above
ground, hell wants its master!"

"Well, think it over," he said. "And, look you,
it would take more than a scruple or two to
keep me from yonder girl" and his evil eye
flashed again at her I loved.

"Get out of my reach!" said I; and yet in a
moment I began to laugh for the very
audacity of it.

"Would you turn against your master?" I
asked.

He swore at Michael for being what the
offspring of a legal, though morganatic, union
should not be called, and said to me, in an
almost confidential and apparently  friendly
tone:

"He gets in my way, you know. He's a jealous
brute! Faith, I nearly stuck a knife into him
last night; he came most cursedly  _i_ mal a'
propos _i_ !"

My temper was well under control now: I was
learning something.

"A lady?" I asked negligently.

"Ay, and a beauty" he nodded "But you've
seen her."

'"Ah! was it at a tea-party, when some of your
friends got on the wrong side of the table?"

"What can you expect of fools like Detchard
and De Gautet? I wish I'd been there."

"And the duke interferes?"

"Well," said Rupert meditatively, "that's
hardly a fair way of putting it, perhaps. I
want to interfere."

"And she prefers the duke?"

"Ay, the silly creature! Ah, well, you think
about my plan ;" and, with a bow, he pricked
his horse and trotted after the body of his
friend.

I went back to Flavia and Sapt, pondering on
the strangeness of the man. Wicked men I
have known in plenty, but Rupert Hentzau
remains unique in my experience. And if
there be another anywhere, let him be caught
and hanged out of hand. So say I!

"He's very handsome, isn't he?" said Flavia.

Well, of course she didn't know him as I did;
yet I was put out, for I thought his bold
glances would have made her angry. But my
dear Flavia was a woman, and so--she was
not put out. On the contrary, she thought
young Rupert very handsome--as, beyond
question, the ruffian was.

"And how sad he looked at his friend's
death!" said she.

"He'll have better reason to be sad at his
own," observed Sapt, with a grim smile.

As for me, I grew sulky; unreasonable it was
perhaps, for what better business had I to
look at her with love than had even Rupert's
lustful eyes? And sulky I remained till, as
evening fell and we rode up to Tarlenheim,
Sapt having fallen behind in case anyone
should be following us, Flavia, riding close
beside me, said softly, with a little
half-ashamed laugh:

"Unless you smile, Rudolf, I cry. Why are you
angry?"

"It was something that fellow said to me,"
said I; but I was smiling as we reached the
doors and dismounted.

There a servant handed me a note; it was
unaddressed.

"Is it for me?" I asked.

"Yes, sire; a boy brought it."

I tore it open:

"Johann carries this for me. I warned you
once. In the name of God, and if you are a
man, rescue me from this den of
murderers!--A. de M."

I handed it to Sapt; but all that the tough old
soul said in reply to this piteous appeal was:

"Whose fault brought her there?"

Nevertheless, not being faultless myself, I
took leave to pity Antoinette de Mauban.

CHAPTER XVI A DESPERATE PLAN

As I had ridden publicly in Zenda, and had
talked there with Rupert of Hentzau, of
course all pretence of illness was at an end. I
marked the effect on the garrison of Zenda:
they ceased to be seen abroad; and any of my
men who went near the Castle reported that
the utmost vigilance prevailed there. Touched
as I was by Madame de Mauban's appeal, I
seemed as powerless to befriend her as I had
proved to help the king. Michael bade me
defiance; and--although he too had been seen
outside the walls--with more disregard for
appearances than he had hitherto shown, he
did not take the trouble to send any excuse
for his failure to wait on the king. Time ran
on in inactivity, when every moment was
pressing; for not only was I faced with the
new danger which the stir about my own
disappearance brought on me, but great
murmurs had arisen in Strelsau at my
continued absence from the city. They had
been greater, but for the knowledge that
Flavia was with me; and for this reason I
suffered her to stay, though I hated to have
her where danger was, and though every day
of our present sweet intercourse strained my
endurance almost to breaking. As a final
blow, nothing would content my advisers,
Strakencz and the Chancellor (who came out
from Strelsau to make an urgent
representation to me) save that I should
appoint a day for the public solemnisation of
my betrothal, a ceremony which in Ruritania
is well-nigh as binding and great a thing as
the marriage itself. And this--with Flavia
sitting by me--I was forced to do, setting a
date a fortnight ahead, and appointing the
Cathedral in Strelsau as the place. And this
formal act being published far and wide,
caused great joy through-out the kingdom,
and was the talk of all tongues: so that I
reckoned there were but two men who
chafed at it--I mean Black Michael and
myself; and but one who did not know of
it--that one the man whose name I bore, the
King of Ruritania.

In truth, I heard something of the way the
news was received in the Castle; for after an
interval of three days, the man Johann,
greedy for more money, though fearful for
his life, again found means to visit us. He had
been waiting on the duke when the tidings
came. Black Michael's face had grown blacker
still, and he had sworn savagely; nor was he
better pleased when young Rupert  took oath
that I meant to do as I said, and turning to
Madame de Mauban, wished her joy on a
rival gone. Michael's hand stole towards his
sword (said Johann), but not a bit did Rupert
care; for he rallied the duke on having made
a better king than had reigned for years past
in Ruritania. "And," said he, with a meaning
bow to his exasperated master, "the devil
sends the princess a finer  man than heaven
had marked out for her, by my soul, it does!"
Then Michael harshly bade him hold his
tongue, and leave them; but Rupert must
needs first kiss madame's hand, which he did
as though he loved her, while Michael glared
at him.

This was the lighter side of the fellow's news;
but more serious came behind, and it was
plain that if time pressed at Tarlenheim, it
pressed none the less fiercely at Zenda. For
the king was very sick: Johann had seen him,
and he was wasted and hardly able to move.
"There could be no thought of taking another
for him now." So alarmed were they, that
they had sent for a physician from Strelsau;
and the physician having been introduced
into the king's cell, had come forth pale and
trembling, and urgently prayed the duke to
let him go back and meddle no more in the
affair; but the duke would not, and held him
there a prisoner, telling him his life was safe
if the king lived while the duke desired and
died when the duke desired--not otherwise.
And, persuaded by the physician, they had
allowed Madame de Mauban to visit the king
and give him such attendance as his state
needed, and as only a woman can give. Yet
his life hung in the balance; and I was still
strong and whole and free. Wherefore great
gloom reigned at Zenda; and save when they
quarrelled, to which they were very prone,
they hardly spoke. But the deeper the
depression of the rest, young Rupert went
about Satan's work with a smile in his eye
and a song on his lip; and laughed "fit to
burst" (said Johann) because the duke always
set Detchard to guard the king when
Madame de Mauban was in the cell--which
precaution was, indeed, not unwise in my
careful brother. Thus Johann told his tale and
seized his crowns. Yet he besought us to
allow him to stay with us in Tarlenheim, and
not venture his head again in the lion's den;
but we had need of him there, and, although
I refused to constrain him, I prevailed on him
by increased rewards to go back and to carry
tidings to Madame de Mauban that I was
working for her, and that, if she could, she
should speak one word of comfort to the
king. For while suspense is bad for the sick,
yet despair is worse still, and it might be that
the king lay dying of mere hope-lessness, for
I could learn of no definite disease that
afflicted him.

"And how do they guard the king now?" I
asked, remembering that two of the Six were
dead, and Max Holf also.

"Detchard and Bersonin watch by night,
Rupert Hentzau and De Gautet by day, sir,"
he answered.

"Only two at a time?"

"Ay, sir; but the others rest in a room just
above, and are within sound of a cry or a
whistle."

"A room just above? I didn't know of that. Is
there any communication between it and the
room where they watch?"

"No, sir. You must go down a few stairs and
through the door by the drawbridge, and so
to where the king is lodged."

"And that door is locked?"

"Only the four lords have keys, sir."

I drew nearer to him.

"And have they keys of the grating?" I asked
in a low whisper.

"I think, sir, only Detchard and Rupert."

"Where does the duke lodge?"

"In the  _i_ cha^teau _i_ , on the first floor.
His apartments are on the right as you go
towards the drawbridge."

"And Madame de Mauban?"

"Just opposite, on the left. But her door is
locked after she has entered."

"To keep her in?"

"Doubtless, sir."

"Perhaps for another reason?"

"It is possible."

"And the duke, I suppose, has the key?"

"Yes. And the drawbridge is drawn back at
night, and of that too the duke holds the key,
so that it cannot be run across the moat
without application to him."

"And where do you sleep?"

"In the entrance-hall of the  _i_ cha^teau _i_ ,
with five servants."

"Armed?"

"They have pikes, sir, but no firearms. The
duke will not trust them with firearms."

Then at last I took the matter boldly in my
hands. I had failed once at Jacob's Ladder; I
should fail again there. I must make the
attack from the other side.

"I have promised you twenty thousand
crowns," said I. "You shall have fifty
thousand if you will do what I ask of you
tomorrow night. But, first, do those servants
know who your prisoner is?"

"No, sir. They believe him to be some private
enemy of the duke's."

"And they would not doubt that I am the
king?"

"How should they?, he asked.

"Look to this, then. To-morrow, at two in the
morning exactly, fling open the front door of
the  _i_ cha^teau _i_. Don't fail by an
instant."

"Shall you be there, sir?"

"Ask no questions. Do what I tell you. Say
the hall is close, or what you will. That is all I
ask of you."

"And may I escape by the door, sir, when I
have opened it?"

"Yes, as quick as your legs will carry you. One
thing more. Carry this note to madame--oh,
it's in French, you can't read it--and charge
her, for the sake of all our lives, not to fail in
what it orders."

The man was trembling, but I had to trust to
what he had of courage and to what he had of
honesty. I dared not wait, for I feared that the
king would die.

When the fellow was gone, I called Sapt and
Fritz to me, and unfolded the plan that I had
formed. Sapt shook his head over it.

"Why can't you wait?" he asked.

"The king may die."

"Michael will be forced to act before that."

"Then," said I, "the king may live."

"Well, and if he does?"

"For a fortnight?" I asked simply.

And Sapt bit his moustache.

Suddenly Fritz von Tarlenheim laid his hand
on my shoulder.

"Let us go and make the attempt," said he.

"I mean you to go--don't be afraid," said I.

"Ay, but do you stay here, and take care of
the princess."

A gleam came into old Sapt's eye.

"We should have Michael one way or the
other then," he chuckled; "whereas if you go,
and are killed with the king, what will
become of those of us who are left?"

"They will serve Queen Flavia," said I, "and I
would to God I could be one of them."

A pause followed. Old Sapt broke it by
saying sadly, yet with an unmeant drollery
that set Fritz and me laughing:

"Why didn't old Rudolf the Third marry
your--great-grandmother, was it?"

"Come," said I, "it is the king we are thinking
about."

"It is true," said Fritz.

"Moreover," I went on, "I have been an
impostor for the profit of another, but I will
not be one for my own; and if the king is not
alive and on his throne before the day of
betrothal comes, I will tell the truth, come
what may."

"You shall go, lad," said Sapt.

Here is the plan I had made. A strong party
under Sapt's command was to steal up to the
door of the  _i_ cha^teau _i_. If dis-covered
prematurely, they were to kill anyone who
found them --with their swords, for I wanted
no noise of firing. If all went well, they would
be at the door when Johann opened it. They
were to rush in and secure the servants if
their mere presence and the use of the king's
name were not enough. At the same
moment--and on this hinged the plan--a
woman's cry was to ring out loud and shrill
from Antoinette de Mauban's chamber.
Again and again she was to cry: "Help, help!
Michael, help!" and then to utter the name of
young Rupert Hentzau. Then, as we hoped,
Michael, in fury, would rush out of his
apart-ments opposite, and fall alive into the
hands of Sapt. Still the cries would go on; my
men would let down the drawbridge; and it
would be strange if Rupert, hearing his name
thus taken in vain, did not descend from
where he slept and seek to cross. De Gautet
might or might not come with him: that must
be left to chance.

And when Rupert set his foot on the
drawbridge? There was my part: for I was
minded for another swim in the moat; and,
lest I should grow weary, I had resolved to
take with me a small wooden ladder, on
which I could rest my arms in the water--and
my feet when I left it. I would rear it against
the wall just by the bridge; and when the
bridge was across, I would stealthily creep on
to it--and then if Rupert or De Gautet crossed
in safety, it would be my misfortune, not my
fault. They dead, two men only  would
remain; and for them we must trust to the
confusion we had created and to a sudden
rush. We should have the keys of the door
that led to the all-important rooms. Perhaps
they would rush out. If they stood by their
orders, then the king's life hung on the
swiftness with which we could force the outer
door; and I thanked God that not Rupert
Hentzau watched, but Detchard. For though
Detchard was a cool man, relentless, and no
coward, he had neither the dash nor the
recklessness of Rupert. Moreover, he, if any
one of them, really loved Black Michael, and
it might be that he would leave Bersonin to
guard the king and rush across the bridge to
take part in the affray on the other side.

So I planned--desperately. And, that our
enemy might be the better lulled to security, I
gave orders that our residence should be
brilliantly lighted from top to bottom, as
though we were engaged in revelry; and
should so be kept all night, with music
playing and people moving to and fro.
Strakencz would be there, and he was to
conceal our departure, if he could, from
Flavia. And if we came not again by the
morning, he was to march, openly and in
force to the Castle, and demand the person of
the king: if Black Michael were not there, as I
did not think he would be, the marshal
would take Flavia  with him, as swiftly as he
could, to Strelsau, and there proclaim Black
Michael's treachery and the probable death
of the king, and rally all that there was
honest and true round the banner of the
princess. And, to say truth, this  was what I
thought most likely to happen. For I had
great doubts whether either the king or Black
Michael or I had more than a day to live.
Well, if Black Michael died, and if I, the
play-actor, slew Rupert Hentzau with my
own hand, and then died myself, it might be
that Fate would deal as lightly with Ruritania
as could be hoped, not-withstanding that she
demanded the life of the king--and to her
dealing thus with me, I was in no temper to
make objection.

It was late when we rose from conference,
and I betook me to the princess's apartments.
She was pensive that evening; yet, when I
left her, she flung her arms about me and
grew, for an instant, bashfully radiant as she
slipped a ring on my finger. I was wearing the
king's ring; but I had also on my little finger a
plain band of gold engraved with the motto
of our family, " _i_ Nil Quae Feci _i_." This I
took off and put on her, and signed to her to
let me go. And she, understanding, stood
away and watched me with dimmed eyes.

"Wear that ring, even though you wear
another when you are queen," I said.

"Whatever else I wear, this I will wear till I
die and after," said she, as she kissed the ring.

CHAPTER XVII YOUNG RUPERT'S
MIDNIGHT DIVERSIONS

THE night came fine and clear. I had prayed
for dirty weather, such as had favoured my
previous voyage in the moat, but Fortune was
this time against me. Still I reckoned that by
keeping close under the wall and in the
shadow I could escape detection from the
windows of the  _i_ cha^teau _i_  that looked
out on the scene of my efforts. If they
searched the moat, indeed, my scheme must
fail; but I did not think they would. They had
made Jacob's Ladder secure against attack.
Johann had himself helped to fix it closely to
the masonry on the under side, so that it
could not now be moved from below any
more than from above. An assault with
explosives or a long battering with picks
alone could displace it, and the noise
involved in either of these operations put
them out of the question. What harm, then,
could a man do in the moat? I trusted that
Black Michael, putting this question to
himself, would answer confidently, "None";
while, even if Johann meant treachery, he did
not know my scheme, and would  doubtless
expect to see me, at the head of my friends,
before the front entrance to the chateau.
There, I said to Sapt, was the real danger.

"And there," I added, "you shall be. Doesn't
that content you?"

But it did not. Dearly would he have liked to
come with me, had I not utterly refused to
take him. One man might escape notice, to
double the party more than doubled the risk;
and when he ventured to hint once again that
my life was too valuable, I, knowing the
secret thought he clung to, sternly bade him
be silent, assuring him that unless the king
lived through the night, I would not live
through it either.

At twelve o'clock, Sapt's command left the
_i_ cha^teau _i_  of Tarlen-heim and struck
off to the right, riding by unfrequented roads,

and avoiding the town of Zenda. If all went
well, they would be in front of the Castle by
about a quarter to two. Leaving their horses
half a mile off, they were to steal up to the
entrance and hold themselves in readiness
for the opening of the door. If the door were
not opened by two, they were to send Fritz
von Tarlenheim round to the other side of the
Castle. I would meet him there if I were
alive, and we would consult whether to storm
the Castle or not. If I were not there, they
were to return with all speed to  Tarlenheim,
rouse the Marshal, and march in force on
Zenda. For if not there, I should be dead; and
I knew that the king would not be alive five
minutes after I had ceased to breathe.

I must now leave Sapt and his friends, and
relate how I my-self proceeded on this
eventful night. I went out on the good horse
which had carried me, on the night of the
coronation, back from the shooting-lodge to
Strelsau. I carried a revolver in the saddle
and my sword. I was covered with a large
cloak, and under this I wore a warm,
tight-fitting woolen jersey, a pair of
knickerbockers, thick stockings, and light
canvas shoes. I had rubbed myself
thoroughly with oil, and I carried a large flask
of whisky. The night was warm, but I might
probably be immersed a long while, and it
was necessary to take every precaution
against cold: for cold not only saps a man's
courage if he has to die, but impairs his
energy if others have to die, and, finally,
gives him rheumatics, if it be God's will that
he live. Also I tied round my body a length of
thin but stout cord, and I did not forget my
ladder. I, starting after Sapt, took a shorter
route, skirting the town to the left, and found
myself in the outskirts of the forest at about
half-past twelve. I tied my horse up in a thick
clump of trees, leaving the revolver in its
pocket in the saddle--it would be no use to
me,--and, ladder in hand, made my way to
the edge of the moat. Here I unwound my
rope from about my waist, bound it securely
round the trunk of a tree on the bank, and let
myself down. The Castle clock struck a
quarter to one as I felt the water under me
and began to swim round the keep, pushing
the ladder before me, and hugging the Castle
wall. Thus voyaging, I came to my old friend,
"Jacob's Ladder," and felt the ledge of
masonry under me. I crouched down in the
shadow of the great pipe--I tried to stir it, but
it was quite immovable--and waited. I
remember that my predominant feeling was,
neither anxiety for the king nor longing for
Flavia, but an intense desire to smoke; and
this craving, of course, I could not gratify.

The drawbridge was still in its place. I saw its
airy, slight framework above me, some ten
yards to my right, as I crouched with my back
against the wall of the king's cell. I made out
a window two yards my side of it and nearly
on the same level. That, if Johann spoke true,
must belong to the duke's apart-ments; and
on the other side, in about the same relative
posi-tion, must be Madame de Mauban's
window. Women are careless, forgetful
creatures. I prayed that she might not forget
that she was to be the victim of a brutal
attempt at two o'clock precisely. I was rather
amused at the part I had assigned to my
young friend Rupert Hentzau; but I owed
him a stroke,--for, even as I sat, my shoulder
ached where he had, with an audacity that
seemed half to hide his treachery, struck at
me, in sight of all my friends, on the terrace
at Tarlenheim.

Suddenly the duke's window grew bright.
The shutters were not closed, and the interior
became partially visible to me as I cautiously
raised myself till I stood on tiptoe.  Thus
placed, my range of sight embraced a yard or
more inside the window, while the radius of
light did not reach me. The window was
flung open and someone looked out. I
marked Antoinette de Mauban's graceful
figure, and, though her face was in shadow,
the fine outline of her head was revealed
against the light behind. I longed to cry
softly, "Remember!" but I dared not--and
happily, for a moment later a man came up
and stood by her. He tried to put his arm
round her waist, but with a swift motion she
sprang away and leant against the shutter,
her profile towards me. I made out who the
new-comer was: it was young Rupert. A low
laugh from him made me sure, as he leant
forwards, stretching out his hand towards
her.

"Gently, gently!" I murmured. "You're too
soon, my boy!"

His head was close to hers. I suppose he
whispered to her, for I saw her point to the
moat, and I heard her say, in slow and
distinct tones:

"I had rather throw myself out of this
window!"

He came close up to the window and looked
out.

"It looks cold," said he. "Come, Antoinette,
are you serious?"

She made no answer, so far as I heard; and
he, smiting his hand petulantly on the
window-sill, went on, in the voice of some
spoilt child:

"Hang Black Michael! Isn't the princess
enough for him? Is he to have everything?
What the devil do you see in Black Michael?"

"If I told him what you say--" she began.

"Well, tell him," said Rupert, carelessly; and,
catching her off her guard, he sprang forward
and kissed her, laughing, and crying, "There's
something to tell him!"

If I had kept my revolver with me, I should
have been very sorely tempted. Being spared
the temptation, I merely added this new
score to his account.

"Though, faith," said Rupert, "It's little he
cares. He's mad about the princess, you
know. He talks of nothing but cutting the
play-actor's throat."

Didn't he, indeed?

"And if I do it for him, what do you think he's
promised me?"

The unhappy woman raised her hands above
her head, in prayer or in despair.

"But I detest waiting," said Rupert; and I saw
that he was about to lay his hand on her
again, when there was a noise of a door in the
room opening, and a harsh voice cried:

"What are you doing here, sir?"

Rupert turned his back to the window,
bowed low, and said, in his loud, merry
tones:

"Apologising for your absence, sir. Could I
leave the lady alone?"

The new-comer must be Black Michael. I saw
him directly, as he advanced towards the
window. He caught young Rupert by the arm.

"The moat would hold more than the king!"
said he, with a significant gesture.

"Does your Highness threaten me?, asked
Rupert.

"A threat is more warning than most men get
from me."

"Yet," observed Rupert, "Rudolf Rassendyll
has been much threatened, and yet lives!"

"Am I in fault because my servants bungle?"
asked Michael scornfully.

"Your Highness has run no risk of bungling!"'
sneered Rupert.

It was telling the duke that he shirked danger
as plain as ever I have heard a man told.
Black Michael had self-control. I daresay he
scowled--it was a great regret to me that I
could not see their faces better,--but his voice
was even and calm, as he answered:

"Enough, enough! We mustn't quarrel,
Rupert. Are Detchard and Bersonin at their
posts?"

"They are, sir."

"I need you no more."

"Nay, I'm not oppressed with fatigue," said
Rupert.

"Pray, sir, leave us," said Michael, more
impatiently. "In ten minutes the drawbridge
will be drawn back, and I presume you have
no wish to swim to your bed."

Rupert's figure disappeared. I heard the door
open and shut again. Michael and Antoinette
de Mauban were left together. To my chagrin,
the duke laid his hand on the  window and
closed it. He stood talking to Antoinette for a
moment or two. She shook her head, and he
turned impatiently away. She left the
window. The door sounded  again, and Black
Michael closed the shutters.

"De Gautet, De Gautet, man!" sounded from
the drawbridge. "Unless you want a bath
before your bed, come along!"

It was Rupert's voice, coming from the end of
the draw-bridge. A moment later he and De
Gautet stepped out on the bridge. Rupert's
arm was through De Gautet's, and in the
middle of the bridge he detained his
companion and leant over. I dropped beside
the shelter of "Jacob's Ladder."

Then Master Rupert had a little sport. He
took from De Gautet a bottle which he
carried, and put it to his lips.

"Hardly a drop!" he cried discontentedly, and
flung it in the moat.

It fell, as I judged from the sound and the
circles on the water, within a yard of the pipe.
And Rupert, taking out his revolver, began to
shoot at it. The first two shots missed the
bottle, but hit the pipe. The third shattered
the bottle. I hoped that the young ruffian
would be content; but he  emptied the other
barrels at the pipe, and one, skimming over
the pipe, whistled through my hair as I
crouched on the other side. "'Ware bridge!" a
voice cried, to my relief.

Rupert and De Gautet cried, "a moment!" and
ran across. The bridge was drawn back, and
all became still. The clock struck a
quarter-past one. I rose and stretched myself
and yawned.

I think some ten minutes had passed when I
heard a slight noise to my right. I peered over
the pipe, and saw a dark figure standing in
the gateway that led to the bridge. It was a
man. By the careless, graceful poise, I guessed
it to be Rupert again. He held a sword in his
hand, and he stood motionless for a minute
or two. Wild thoughts ran through me. On
what mischief was the young fiend bent
now? Then he laughed low to himself; then
he turned his face to the wall, took a step in
my direction, and, to my surprise, began to
climb down the wall. In an instant I saw that
there must be steps in the wall; it was plain,
They were cut into or affixed to the wall, at
intervals of about eighteen inches. Rupert set
his foot on the lower one. Then he placed his
sword between his teeth, turned round, and
noiselessly let himself down into the water.
Had it been a matter of my life only, I would
have swum to meet him. Dearly would I have
loved to fight it out with him then and
there--with steel, on a fine night and none to
come between us. But there was the king! I
restrained myself, but I could not bridle my
swift breathing, and I watched him with the
intensest eagerness.

He swam leisurely and quietly across. There
were more foot-steps up on the other side,
and he climbed them. When he set foot in the
gateway, standing on the drawn-back bridge,
he felt in his pocket and took something out.
I heard him unlock the door. I could near no
noise of its closing behind him. He vanished
from my sight.

Abandoning my ladder--l saw I did not need
it now,--l swam to the side of the bridge, and
climbed hallway up the steps. There I hung,
with my sword in my hand, listening eagerly.
The duke's room was shuttered and dark.
There was a light in the window on the
opposite side of the bridge. Not a sound
broke the silence, till half-past one chimed
from the great clock in the tower of the  _i_
cha^teau. _i_.

There were other plots than mine afoot in the
Castle that night.

CHAPTER XVIII THE FORCING OF THE
TRAP

The position wherein I stood does not appear
very favourable to thought; yet for the next
moment or two I thought profoundly. I had, I
told myself, scored one point. Be Rupert
Hentzau's errand what it might, and the
villainy he was engaged on what it would, I
had scored one point. He was on the other
side of the moat from the king, and it would
be by no fault of mine if ever he set foot on
the same side again. I had three left to deal
with: two on guard and De Gautet in his bed.
Ah!, if I had the keys! I  would have risked
everything and attacked Detchard and
Bersonin before their friends could join them.
But I was powerless. I must wait till the
coming of my friends enticed someone to
cross the bridge--someone with keys. And I
waited, as it seemed, for half-an-hour, really
for about five minutes, before the next act in
the rapid drama began.

All was still on the other side. The duke's
room remained inscrutable behind its
shutters. The light burnt steadily in Madame
de Mauban's window. Then I heard the
faintest, faintest sound: it came from behind
the door which led to the drawbridge on the
other side of the moat. It but just reached my
ear, yet I could not be mistaken as to what it
was. It was made by a key being turned very
carefully and slowly. Who was turning it?
And of what room was it the key? There leapt
before my eyes the picture of young  Rupert,
with the key in one hand, his sword in the
other, and an evil smile on his face. But I did
not know what door it was, nor on which of
his favourite pursuits young Rupert was
spending the hours of that night.

I was soon to be enlightened, for the next
moment--before friends could be near the _i_
cha^teau _i_  door--before Johann the keeper
would have thought to nerve himself for his
task--there was a sudden crash from the room
with the lighted window. It sounded as
though someone had flung down a lamp; and
the window went dark and black. At the
same instant a cry rang out, shrill in the night:
"Help, help! Michael, help!" and was followed
by a shriek of utter  terror.

I was tingling in every nerve. I stood on the
topmost step, clinging to the threshold of the
gate with my right hand and holding my
sword in my left. Suddenly I perceived that
the gateway was broader than the bridge;
there was a dark corner on the opposite side
where a man could stand. I darted across and
stood there. Thus placed, I commanded the
path, and no man could pass between the  _i_
cha^teau _i_  and the old Castle till he had
tried conclusions with me.

There was another shriek. Then a door was
flung open and clanged against the wall, and
I heard the handle of a door savagely twisted.

"Open the door! In God's name, what's the
matter?" cried a voice--the voice of Black
Michael himself.

He was answered by the very words I had
written in my letter:

"Help, Michael--Hentzau!"

A fierce oath rang out from the duke, and
with a loud thud he threw himself against the
door. At the same moment I heard a window
above my head open, and a voice cried:
"What's the matter?" and I heard a man's
hasty footsteps. I grasped my sword. If De
Gautet came my way, the Six would be less
by one more.

Then I heard the clash of crossed swords and
a tramp of feet, and--I cannot tell the thing so
quickly as it happened, for all seemed to
come at once. There was an angry cry from
madame's room, the cry of a wounded man;
the window was flung open; young Rupert
stood there sword in hand. He turned his
back, and I saw his body go forward to the
lunge.

"Ah, Johann, there's one for you! Come on,
Michael!"

Johann was there, then--come to the rescue of
the duke! How would he open the door for
me? For I feared that Rupert had slain him.

"Help!" cried the duke's voice, faint and
husky.

I heard a step on the stairs above me; and I
heard a stir down to my right, in the direction
of the king's cell. But, before anything
happened on my side of the moat, I saw five
or six men round young Rupert in the
embrasure of madame's window. Three or
four times he lunged with incomparable dash
and dexterity. For an instant they fell  back,
leaving a ring round him. He leapt on the
parapet of the window, laughing as he leapt,
and waving his sword in his hand. He was
drunk with blood, and he laughed again
wildly as he flung himself headlong into the
moat.

What became of him then? I did not see: for
as he leapt, De Gautet's lean face looked out
through the door by me, and, without a
second's hesitation, I struck at him with all
the strength God had given me, and he fell
dead in the doorway without a word or a
groan. I dropped on my knees by him. Where
were the keys? I found myself muttering:
"The keys, man, the keys?" as though he had
been yet alive and could listen; and when I
could not find them, I--God forgive me!
believe I struck a dead man's face.

At last I had them. There were but three.
Seizing the largest, I felt the lock of the door
that led to the cell. I fitted in the key. It was
right! The lock turned. I drew the door close
behind me and locked it as noiselessly as I
could, putting the key in my pocket.

I found myself at the top of a flight of steep
stone stairs. An oil-lamp burnt dimly in the
bracket. I took it down and held it in my
hand; and I stood and listened.

"What in the devil can it be?" I heard a voice
say.

It came from behind a door that faced me at
the bottom of the stairs.

And another answered:

"Shall we kill him?"

I strained to hear the answer, and could have
sobbed with relief when Detchard's voice
came grating and cold:

"Wait a bit. there'll be trouble if we strike too
soon."

There was a moment's silence. Then I heard
the bolt of the door cautiously drawn back.
Instantly I put out the light I held, replacing
the lamp in the bracket.

"'It's dark--the Iamp's out. Have you a light?"
said the other voice--Bersonin's.

No doubt they had a light, but they should
not use it. It was come to the crisis now, and I
rushed down the steps and flung myself
against the door. Bersonin had unbolted it
and it gave way before me. The Belgian stood
there sword in hand, and Detchard was
sitting on a couch at the side of the room. In
astonishment at seeing me, Bersonin
recoiled; Detchard jumped to his sword. I
rushed madly at the Belgian: He gave way
before me, and I drove him up against the
wail. He was no swordsman, though he
fought bravely, and in a moment he lay on
the floor before me. I turned--Detchard was
not there. Faithful to his orders, he had not
risked a fight with me, but had rushed
straight to the door of the king's room,
opened it and slammed it behind him. Even
now he was at his work inside.

And surely he would have killed the king,
and perhaps me also, had it not been for one
devoted man who gave his life for the king.
For when I forced the door, the sight I saw
was this. The king stood in the corner of the
room: broken by his sickness, he could do
nothing; his fettered hands moved uselessly
up and down, and he was laughing horribly
in half-mad delirium. Detchard and the
doctor were together in the middle of the
room; and the doctor had flung himself on
the murderer, pinning his hands to his sides
for an instant. Then Detchard wrenched
himself free from the feeble grip and, as I
entered, drove his sword through the hapless
man. Then he turned on me, crying:

"At last!"

We were sword to sword. By blessed chance,
neither he nor Bersonin had been wearing
their revolvers. I found them afterwards,
ready loaded, on the mantelpiece of the
outer room: it was hard by the door, ready to
their hands, but my sudden rush in had cut
off access to them. Yes, we were man to man:
and we began to fight, silently, sternly, and
hard. Yet I re-member little of it, save that
the man was my match with the sword--nay,
and more, for he knew more tricks than I;
and that he forced me back against the bars
that guarded the entrance to "Jacob's Ladder."
And I saw a smile on his face, and he
wounded me in the left arm.

No glory do I take for that contest. I believe
that the man would have mastered me and
slain me, and then done his butcher's work,
for he was the most skilful swordsman I
have ever met; but even as he pressed me
hard, the half-mad, wasted, wan creature in
the corner leapt high in lunatic mirth,
shrieking:

"It's cousin Rudolf! Cousin Rudolf! I'll help
you, cousin Rudolf!" and catching up a chair
in his hands (he could but just lift it from the
ground and hold it uselessly before him) he
came towards us. Hope came to me.

"Come on!" I cried. "Come on! Drive it against
his legs." Detchard replied with a savage
thrust. He all but had me.

"Come on! Come on, man!" I cried. "Come
and share the fun."

And the king laughed gleefully, and came on,
pushing his chair before him.

With an oath Detchard skipped back, and,
before I knew 'what he was doing, had
turned his sword against the king. He made
one fierce cut at the king, and the king, with a
piteous cry, dropped where he stood. The
stout ruffian turned to face me again. But his
own hand had prepared his destruction: for
in turning, he trod in the pool of blood that
flowed from the dead physician. He slipped;
he fell. Like a dart I was upon him. I caught
him by the throat, and before he could
recover him-self I drove my point through
his neck, and with a stifled curse he fell
across the body of his victim.

Was the king dead? It was my first thought. I
rushed to where he lay. Ay, it seemed as if he
were dead, for he had a great gash across the
forehead, and he lay still in a huddled heap
on the floor. I dropped on my knees beside
him, and leant my ear down to hear if he
breathed. But before I could, there was a loud
rattle from the outside. I knew the sound: the
draw-bridge was being pushed out. A
moment later it rang home against the wall
on my side of the moat. I should be caught in
a trap and the king with me, if he yet lived.
He must take his chance, to live or to die. I
took my sword, and passed into the outer
room. Who were pushing the drawbridge
out--my men? If so, all was well. My eye fell
on the revolvers, and I seized one; and
paused to listen in the doorway of the outer
room. To listen, say I? Yes, and to get my
breath: and I tore my shirt and twisted a strip
of it round my bleeding arm; and stood
listening again. I would have given the world
to hear Sapt's voice. For I was faint, spent,
and weary. And that wild-cat Rupert Hentzau
was yet at large in the Castle. Yet, because I
could better defend the narrow door at the
top of the stairs than the wider entrance to
the room, I dragged myself up the steps, and
stood behind it listening.

What was the sound? Again a strange one for
the place and the time. An easy, scornful,
merry laugh--the laugh of young Rupert
Hentzau! I could scarcely believe that a sane
man would laugh. Yet the laugh told me that
my men had not come; for they must have
shot Rupert ere now, if they had come. And
the clock struck half-past two! My God! The
door had not been opened! They had gone to
the bank! They had not found me! They had
gone by now back to Tarlenheim, with the
news of the king's death--and mine. Well, it
would be true before they got there. Was not
Rupert laughing in triumph?

For a moment I sank, unnerved, against the
door. Then I started up alert again, for Rupert
cried scornfully:

"Well, the bridge is there! Come over it! and
in God's name, let's see Black Michael. Keep
back, you curs! Michael, come and fight for
her!"

If it were a three-cornered fight, I might yet
bear my part. I turned the key in the door
and looked out.

CHAPTER XIX FACE TO FACE IN THE
FOREST

FOR a moment I could see nothing, for the
glare of lanterns and torches caught me full in
the eyes from the other side of the bridge.
But soon the scene grew clear: and it was a
strange scene. The bridge was in its place. At
the far end of it stood a group of the duke's
servants; two or three carried the lights which
had dazzled me, three or four held pikes in
rest. They were huddled together; their
weapons were protruded before them; their
faces were pale and agitated. To put it
plainly, they looked in as arrant a fright as I
have seen men look, and they gazed
apprehensively at a man who stood in the
middle of the bridge, sword in hand. Rupert
Hentzau was in his trousers and shirt; the
white linen was stained with blood, but his
easy, buoyant pose told me that he was
himself either not touched at all or merely
scratched. There he stood, holding the bridge
against them, and daring them to come on; or,
rather, bidding them send Black Michael to
him; and they, having no firearms, cowered
before the desperate man and dared not
attack him. They whispered to one  another;
and, in the backmost rank, I saw my friend
Johann, leaning against the portal of the door
and stanching with a handkerchief the blood
which flowed from a wound in his cheek.

By marvellous chance, I was master. The
cravens would oppose me no more than they
dared attack Rupert. I had but to raise my
revolver, and I sent him to his account with
his sins on his head. He did not so much as
know that I was there. I did nothing--why I
hardly know to this day. I had killed one man
stealthily that night, and another by  luck
rather than skill--perhaps it was that. Again,
villain as the man was, I did not relish being
one of a crowd against him--perhaps it was
that. But stronger than either of these
restraining feelings came a curiosity and a
fascination which held me spellbound,
watching for the outcome of the scene.

"Michael, you dog! Michael! If you can stand,
come on!" cried Rupert; and he advanced a
step, the group shrinking back a little before
him. "Michael, you bastard! come on!,

The answer to his taunts came in the wild cry
of a woman:

"He's dead! My God, he's dead!"

"Dead!" shouted Rupert. "I struck better than
I knew!" and he laughed triumphantly. Then
he went on: "Down with your weapons there!
I'm your master now! Down with  them, I
say!"

I believe they would have obeyed, but as he
spoke came new things. First, there arose a
distant sound, as of shouts and knockings
from the other side of the chateau. My heart
leapt. It must be my men, come by a happy
disobedience to seek me. The noise
continued, but none of the rest seemed to
heed it. Their attention was chained by what
now happened before their eyes. The group
of servants parted and a woman staggered on
to the bridge. Antoinette de Mauban was in a
loose white robe, her dark hair streamed over
her shoulders, her face was ghastly pale, and
her eyes gleamed wildly in the light of the
torches. In her shaking hand she held a
revolver, and, as she tottered forward, she
fired it at Rupert Hentzau. The ball missed
him, and struck the woodwork over my head.

"Faith, madame," laughed Rupert, "had your
eyes been no more deadly than your
shooting, I had not been in this scrape--nor
Black Michael in hell--to-night!"

She took no notice of his words. With a
wonderful effort, she calmed herself till she
stood still and rigid. Then very slowly and
deliberately she began to raise her arm again,
taking most careful aim.

He would be mad to risk it. He must rush on
her, chancing the bullet, or retreat towards
me. I covered him with my weapon.

He did neither. Before she had got her aim,
he bowed in his most graceful fashion, cried
"I can't kill where I've kissed," and before she
or I could stop him, laid his hand on the
parapet of the bridge, and lightly leapt into
the moat.

At the very moment I heard a rush of feet,
and a voice I knew--Sapt's--cry: "God! it's the
duke--dead!" Then I knew that the king
needed me no more, and, throwing down my
revolver, I sprang out on the bridge. There
was a cry of  wild wonder, "The king!" and
then I, like Rupert Hentzau, sword in hand,
vaulted over the parapet, intent on finishing
my quarrel with him where I saw his curly
head  fifteen yards off in the water of the
moat.

He swam swiftly and easily. I was weary and
half-crippled with my wounded arm. I could
not gain on him. For a time I made no sound,
but as we rounded the corner of the old keep
I cried:

"Stop, Rupert, stop!"

I saw him look over his shoulder, but he
swam on. He was under the bank now,
searching, as I guessed, for a spot that he
could climb. I knew there to be none--but
there was my rope, which would still be
hanging where I had left it. He would come
to where it was before I could. Perhaps he
would miss it--perhaps he would find it; and
if he drew it up after him, he would get a
good start of me. I put forth all my remaining
strength and pressed on. At last I began to
gain on him; for he, occupied with his search,
unconsciously slackened his pace.

Ah, he had found it! A low shout of triumph
came from him. He laid hold of it and began
to haul himself up. I was near enough to hear
him mutter: "How the devil comes this
here?" I was at the rope, and he, hanging in
mid-air, saw me; but I could not reach him.

"Hullo! who's here?" he cried in startled
tones.

For a moment, I believe, he took me for the
king--I daresay I was pale enough to lend
colour to the thought; but an instant later he
cried:

"Why, it's the play-actor! How came you here,
man?"

And so saying, he gained the bank.

I laid hold of the rope, but I paused. He stood
on the bank, sword in hand, and he could cut
my head open or spit me through the heart as
I came up. I let go the rope.

"Never mind," said I; "but as I am here, I
think I'll stay."

He smiled down on me.

"These women arc the deuce--"he began;
when suddenly the great bell of the Castle
started to ring furiously, and a loud shout
reached us from the moat.

Rupert smiled again, and waved his hand to
me.

"I should like a turn with you, but it's a little
too hot!" said he, and he disappeared from
above me.

In an instant, without thinking of danger, I
laid my hand to the rope. I was up. I saw him
thirty yards off, running like a deer towards
the shelter of the forest. For once Rupert
Hentzau had chosen discretion for his part. I
laid my feet to the ground and rushed after
him, calling to him to stand. He would not.
Unwounded and vigorous, he gained on me
at every step; but, forgetting everything in
the world except him and my thirst for his
blood, I pressed on, and soon the deep
shades of the forest of Zenda engulfed us
both, pursued and pursuer.

It was three o'clock now, and day was
dawning. I was on a long straight grass
avenue, and a hundred yards ahead ran
young Rupert, his curls waving in the fresh
breeze. I was weary and panting; he looked
over his shoulder and waved his hand again
to me. He was mocking me, for he saw he
had the pace of me. I was forced to pause for
breath. A moment later, Rupert turned
sharply to the right and was lost from my
sight.

I thought all was over, and in deep vexation
sank on the ground. But I was up again
directly, for a scream rang through the
forest--a woman's scream. Putting forth the
last of my strength, I ran on to the place
where he had turned out of my sight, and,
turning also, I saw him again. But alas! I
could not touch him. He was in the act of
lifting a girl down from her horse; doubtless
it was her scream that I heard. She looked
like a small farmer's or a peasant's daughter,
and she carried a basket on her arm.
Probably she was on her way to the early
market at Zenda. Her horse was a stout,
well-shaped animal. Master Rupert lifted her
down amid her shrieks--the sight of him
frightened her; but he treated her gently,
laughed, kissed her, and gave her money.
Then he jumped on the horse, sitting
sideways like a woman; and then he waited
for me. I, on my part, waited for him.

Presently he rode towards me, keeping his
distance however. He lifted up his hand,
saying:

"What did you in the Castle?"

"I killed three of your friends," said I.

"What! You got to the cells?"

"Yes."

"And the king?"

"He was hurt by Detchard before I killed
Detchard, but I pray that he lives."

"You fool!" said Rupert, pleasantly.

"One thing more I did."

"And what's that?"

"I spared your life. I was behind you on the
bridge, with a revolver in my hand."

"No? Faith, I was between two fires!"

"Get off your horse," I cried, "and fight like a
man."

"Before a lady!" said he, pointing to the girl.
"Fie, your Majesty!"

Then in my rage, hardly knowing what I did,
I rushed at him. For a moment he seemed to
waver. Then he reined his horse in and stood
waiting for me. On I went in my folly. I
seized the bridle and I struck at him. He
parried and thrust at me. I fell back a pace
and rushed in at him again; and this time I
reached his face and laid his cheek open, and
darted back before he could strike me. He
seemed almost mazed at the fierceness of my
attack; otherwise I think he must have killed
me. I sank on my knee panting,  expecting
him to ride at me. And so he would have
done, and then and there, I doubt not, one or
both of us would have died; but at the
moment there came a shout from behind us,
and, looking round, I saw, just at the turn of
the avenue, a man on a horse. He was riding
hard, and he carried a revolver in his hand. It
was Fritz von Tarlenheim, my faithful friend.
Rupert saw him, and knew that the game was
up. He checked his rush at me and flung his
leg over the saddle, but yet for just a moment
he waited. Leaning forward, he tossed his
hair off his forehead and smiled, and said:

" _i_ Au revoir _i_ , Rudolf Rassendyll!"

Then, with his cheek streaming blood, but his
lips laughing and his body swaying with ease
and grace, he bowed to me; and he bowed to
the farm-girl, who had drawn near in
trembling fascination, and he waved his
hand to Fritz, who was just within range and
let fly a shot at him. The ball came nigh doing
its work, for it struck the sword he held, and
he dropped the sword with an oath, wringing
his fingers, and clapped his heels hard on his
horse's belly, and rode away at a gallop.

And I watched him go down the long avenue,
riding as though he rode for his pleasure and
singing as he went, for all there was that gash
in his cheek.

Once again he turned to wave his hand, and
then the gloom of the thickets swallowed him
and he was lost from our sight. Thus he
vanished--reckless and wary, graceful and
graceless, handsome, debonair, vile, and
unconquered. And I flung my sword
passionately on the ground and cried to Fritz
to ride after him. But Fritz stopped his horse,
and leapt down and ran to me, and knelt,
putting his arm about me. And indeed it was
time, for the wound that Detchard had given
me was broken forth afresh, and my blood
was staining the ground.

"Then give me the horse!" I cried, staggering
to my feet and throwing his arms off me. And
the strength of my rage carried me so far as
where the horse stood, and then I fell prone
beside it. And Fritz knelt by me again.

"Fritz!" I said.

"Ay, friend--dear friend!" said he, tender as a
woman.

"Is the king alive?"

He took his handkerchief and wiped my lips,
and bent and kissed me on the forehead.

"Thanks to the most gallant gentleman that
lives," said he softly, "the king is alive!"

The little farm-girl stood by us, weeping for
fright and wide-eyed for wonder; for she had
seen me at Zenda: and was not I, pallid,
dripping, foul, and bloody as I was--yet was
not I the king?

And when I heard that the king was alive, I
strove to cry "Hurrah!" But I could not speak,
and I laid my head back in Fritz's arms and
closed my eyes, and I groaned; and then, lest
Fritz should do me wrong in his thoughts, I
opened my eyes and tried to say "Hurrah!"
again. But I could not. And being very tired,
and now very cold, I huddled myself close up
to Fritz, to get the warmth of him, and shut
my eyes again and went to sleep.

CHAPTER XX THE PRISONER AND THE
KING

In order to a full understanding of what had
occurred in the Castle of Zenda, it is
necessary to supplement my account of what
I myself saw and did on that night by
relating briefly what I afterwards learnt from
Fritz and from Madame de Mauban. The
story told by the latter explained clearly how
it happened that the cry which I had
arranged as a stratagem and a sham had
come, in dreadful reality, before its time, and
had thus, as it seemed at the moment, ruined
our hopes, while in the end it had favoured
them. The unhappy woman, fired, I believe,
by a genuine attachment to the Duke of
Strelsau, no less than by the dazzling
prospects which a dominion over him
opened before her eyes, had followed him at
his request from Paris to Ruritania. He was a
man of strong passions, but of stronger will,
and his cool head ruled both. He was content
to take all and give nothing. When she
arrived, she was not long in finding that she
had a rival in the Princess Flavia; rendered
desperate, she stood at nothing which might
give, or keep for her, her power over the
duke. As I say, he took and gave not.
Simultaneously, Antoinette found herself
entangled in his audacious schemes.
Unwilling to abandon him, bound to him by
the chains of shame and hope, yet she would
not be a decoy, nor, at his bidding, lure me to
death. Hence the letters of warning she had
written. Whether the lines she sent to Flavia
were inspired by good or bad feeling, by
jealousy or by pity, I do not know; but here
also she served us well. When the duke went
to Zenda, she accompanied him; and here for
the first time she learnt the full measure of
his cruelty, and was touched with compassion
for the unfortunate king. From this time she
was with us; yet, from what she told me, I
know that she still (as women will) loved
Michael, and trusted to gain his life, if not his
pardon from the king, as the reward for her
assistance. His triumph she did not desire, for
she loathed his crime, and loathed yet more
fiercely what would be the prize of  it--his
marriage with his cousin, Princess Flavia.

At Zenda new forces came into play--the lust
and daring of young Rupert. He was caught
by her beauty, perhaps; perhaps it was
enough for him that she belonged to another
man, and that she hated him. For many days
there had been quarrels and ill-will between
him and the duke, and the scene which I had
witnessed in the duke's room was but one of
many. Rupert's proposals to me, of which
she had, of course, been ignorant, in no way
surprised her when I related them; she had
herself warned Michael against Rupert, even
when she was calling on me to deliver her
from both of them. On this night, then,
Rupert had determined to have his will.
When she had gone to her room, he, having
furnished himself with a key to it, had made
his entrance. Her cries had brought the duke,
and there in the dark room, while she
screamed, the men had fought; and Rupert,
having wounded his master with a mortal
blow, had, on the servants rushing in,
escaped through the window as I have
described. The duke's blood, spurting out,
had stained his opponent's shirt; but Rupert,
not knowing that he had dealt Michael his
death, was eager to finish the en-counter.
How he meant to deal with the other three of
the band, I know not. I daresay he did not
think, for the killing of Michael was not
premeditated. Antoinette, left alone with the
duke, had tried to stanch his wound, and thus
was she busied till he died; and then,  hearing
Rupert's taunts, she had come forth to
avenue him. Me she had not seen, nor did
she till I darted out of my ambush, and leapt
after Rupert into the moat.

The same moment found my friends on the
scene. They had reached the  _i_ cha^teau _i_
in due time, and waited ready by the door.
But Johann, swept with the rest to the rescue
of the duke, did not open it; nay, he took a
part against Rupert, putting himself forward
more bravely than any in his anxiety to avert
suspi-cion; and he had received a wound, in
the embrasure of the window. Till nearly
half-past two Sapt waited; then, following my
orders, he had sent Fritz to search the banks
of the moat.

I was not there. Hastening back, Fritz told
Sapt; and Sapt was for following orders still,
and riding at full speed back to Tarlenheim;
while Fritz would not hear of abandoning
me, let me have ordered what I would. On
this they disputed some few minutes; then
Sapt, persuaded by Fritz, detached a party
under Bernenstein to gallop back to
Tarlenheim and bring up the marshal, while
the rest fell to on the great door of the
chateau. For several minutes it resisted them;
then, just as Antoinette de Mauban fired at
Rupert Hentzau on the bridge, they broke in,
eight of them in all: and the first door they
came to was the door of Michael's room; and
Michael lay dead across the threshold, with a
sword-thrust through his breast. Sapt cried
out at his death, as I had heard, and they
rushed on the servants; but these, in fear,
dropped their weapons, and Antoinette flung
herself weeping at Sapt's feet. And all she
cried was, that I had been at the end of the
bridge and had leapt off. "What of the
prisoner?" asked Sapt; but she shook her
head. Then Sapt and Fritz, with the
gentlemen behind them, crossed the bridge,
slowly, warily, and without noise; and Fritz
stumbled over the body of De Gautet in the
way of the door. They felt him and found
him dead.

Then they consulted, listening eagerly for any
sound from the cells below; but there came
none, and they were greatly afraid that the
king's guards had killed him, and having
pushed his body through the great pipe, had
escaped the same way themselves. Yet,
because I had been seen here, they had still
some hope (thus indeed Fritz, in his
friendship, told me); and going back to
Michael's body, pushing aside Antoinette,
who prayed by it, they found a key to the
door which I had locked, and opened the
door. The staircase was dark, and they would
not use a torch at first, lest they should be the
more exposed to fire. But soon Fritz cried:
"The door down there is open! See, there is
light!" so they went on boldly, and found
none to oppose them. And when they came
to the outer room and saw the Belgian,
Bersonin, lying dead, they thanked God, Sapt
saying: "Ay, he has been here." Then rushing
into the king's cell, they found Detchard lying
dead across the dead physician, and the king
on his back with his chair by him. And Fritz
cried: "He's dead!" and Sapt drove all out of
the room except Fritz, and knelt down by the
king; and, having learnt more of wounds and
the signs of death than I, he soon knew that
the king was not dead, nor, if properly
attended, would die. And they covered his
face and carried him to Duke Michael's room,
and laid him there; and Antoinette rose from
praying by the body of the duke and went to
bathe the king's head and dress his wounds,
till a doctor came. And Sapt, seeing I had
been there, and having heard Antoinette's
story, sent Fritz to search the moat and then
the forest. He dared send no one else. And
Fritz found my horse, and feared the worst.
Then, as I have told, he found me, guided by
the shout with which I had called on Rupert
to stop and face me. And I think a man has
never been more glad to find his own brother
alive than was Fritz to come on me; so that, in
love and anxiety for me, he thought nothing
of a thing so great as would have been the
death of Rupert Hentzau. Yet, had Fritz
killed him, I  should have grudged it.

The enterprise of the king's rescue being thus
prosperously concluded, it lay on Colonel
Sapt to secure secrecy as to the king ever
having been in need of rescue. Antoinette de
Mauban and Johann the keeper (who,
indeed, was too much hurt to be wagging his
tongue just now) were sworn to reveal
nothing; and Fritz went forth to find--not the
king, but the unnamed friend of the king,
who had lain in Zenda and flashed for a
moment before the dazed eyes of Duke
Michael's servants on the drawbridge. The
metamorphosis had happened; and the king,
wounded almost to death by the attacks of
the gaolers who guarded his friend, had at
last overcome them, and rested now,
wounded but alive, in Black Michael's own
room in the Castle. There he had been
carried, his face covered with a cloak, from
the cell; and thence orders issued, that if his
friend were found, he should be brought
directly and privately to the king, and that
meanwhile messengers should ride at full
speed to Tarlenheim, to tell Marshal
Strakencz to assure the princess of the king's
safety, and to come himself with all speed to
greet the king. The princess was enjoined to
remain at Tarlenheim, and there await her
cousin's coming or his further injunctions.

Thus the king would come to his own again,
having wrought brave deeds, and escaped,
almost by a miracle, the treacherous assault
of his unnatural brother.

This ingenious arrangement of my
long-headed old friend prospered in every
way, save where it encountered a force that
often defeats the most cunning schemes. I
mean nothing else than the pleasure of a
woman. For, let her cousin and sovereign
send what command he chose (or Colonel
Sapt chose for him), and let Marshal
Strakencz insist as he would, the Princess
Flavia was in no way minded to rest at
Tarlenheim while her lover lay wounded at
Zenda; and when the marshal, with a small
_i_ suite _i_ , rode forth from Tarlenheim on
the way to Zenda, the princess's carriage
followed immediately behind, and in this
order they passed through the town, where
the report was already rife that the king,
going the night before to remonstrate with
his brother, in all friendliness, for that he
held one of the king's friends in confinement
in the Castle, had been most traitorously set
upon; that there had been a desperate
conflict; that the duke was slain with several
of his gentlemen; and that the king, wounded
as he was, had seized and held the Castle of
Zenda. All of which talk made, as may be
supposed, a mighty excitement; and the wires
were set in motion, and the tidings came to
Strelsau only just after orders had been sent
thither to parade the troops and overawe the
dissatisfied quarters of the town with a
display of force.

Thus the Princess Flavia came to Zenda. And
as she drove up the hill, with the marshal
riding by the wheel and still imploring her to
return in obedience to the king's orders, Fritz
von Tarlenheim, with the prisoner of Zenda,
came to the edge of the forest. I had revived
from my swoon, and walked, resting on
Fritz's arm; and looking out from the cover of
the trees, I saw the princess. Suddenly
understanding from a glance at my
companion's face that we must not meet her,
I sank on my knees behind a clump of
bushes. But there was one whom we had
forgotten, but who followed us, and was not
disposed to let slip the chance of earning a
smile and maybe a crown or two; and, while
we lay hidden, the little farm-girl came by us
and ran to the princess, curtseying and crying:

"Madame, the king is here--in the bushes!
May I guide you to him, madame?"

"Nonsense, child!" said old Strakencz; "the
king lies wounded in the Castle."

"Yes, sir, he's wounded, I know; but he's
there--with Count Fritz--and not at the
Castle," she persisted.

"Is he in two places, or are there two kings?"
asked Flavia, bewildered. "And how should
he be here?"

"He pursued a gentleman, madame, and they
fought till Count Fritz came; and the other
gentleman took my father's horse from me
and rode away; but the king is here with
Count Fritz. Why, madame, is there another
man in Ruritania like the king?"

"No, my child," said Flavia softly (I was told it
afterwards), and she smiled and gave the girl
money. "I will go and see this gentleman" and
she rose to alight from the carriage.

But at this moment Sapt came riding from the
Castle, and, seeing the princess, made the
best of a bad job, and cried to her that the
king was well tended and in no danger.

"In the Castle?" she asked.

"Where else, madame?" said he, bowing.

"But this girl says he is yonder--with Count
Fritz."

Sapt turned his eyes on the child with an
incredulous smile.

"Every fine gentleman is a king to such," said
he.

"Why, he's as like the king as one pea to
another, madame!" cried the girl, a little
shaken but still obstinate.

Sapt started round. The old marshal's face
asked unspoken questions. Flavia's glance
was no less eloquent. Suspicion spreads
quick.

"I'll ride myself and see this man," said Sapt,
hastily.

"Nay, I'll come myself," said the princess.

"Then come alone," he whispered.

And she, obedient to the strange hinting in
his face, prayed the marshal and the rest to
wait; and she and Sapt came on foot towards
where we lay, Sapt waving to the farm-girl to
keep at a distance. And when I saw them
coming, I sat in a sad heap on the ground,
and buried my face in my hands. I could not
look at her. Fritz knelt by me, laying his hand
on my shoulder.

"Speak low, whatever you say," I heard Sapt
whisper as they came up; and the next thing I
heard was a low cry--half of joy, half of
fear--from the princess:

"It is he! Are you hurt?"

And she fell on the ground by me, and gently
pulled my hands away; but I kept my eyes to
the ground.

"It is the king!" she said. "Pray, Colonel Sapt,
tell me where lay the wit of the joke you
played on me?"

We answered, none of us: we three were
silent before her. Regardless of them, she
threw her arms round my neck and kissed
me. Then Sapt spoke in a low hoarse
whisper:

"It is not the king. Don't kiss him; he's not the
king."

She drew back for a moment; then, with an
arm still round my neck, she asked, in superb
indignation:

"Do I not know my love? Rudolf, my love!"

"It is not the king," said old Sapt again; and a
sudden sob broke from tender-hearted Fritz.

It was the sob that told her no comedy was
afoot.

"He is the king!" she cried. "It is the king's
face--the king's ring--my ring! It is my love!"

"Your love, madame," said old Sapt, "but not
the king. The king is there in the Castle. This
gentleman--"

"Look at me, Rudolf! look at me!" she cried,
taking my face between her hands. "Why do
you let them torment me? Tell me what it
means!"

Then I spoke, gazing into her eyes.

"God forgive me, madame!" I said, "I am not
the king!"

I felt her hands clutch my cheeks. She gazed
at me as never man's face was scanned yet.
And I, silent again, saw wonder born, and
doubt grow, and terror spring to life as she
looked. And very gradually the grasp of her
hands slackened: she turned to Sapt, to Fritz,
and back to me: then suddenly she reeled
forward and fell in my arms; and with a great
cry of pain I gathered her to me and kissed
her lips. Sapt laid his hand on my arm. I
looked up in his face. And I laid her softly on
the ground, and stood up, looking on her,
cursing heaven that young Rupert's sword
had spared me for this sharper pang.

CHAPTER XXI IF LOVE WERE ALL!

It was night, and I was in the cell wherein the
king had lain the Castle of Zenda. The great
pipe that Rupert of Hentzau had nicknamed
"Jacob's Ladder" was gone, and the lights in
the room across the moat twinkled in the
darkness. All was still; the din and clash of
strife were gone. I had spent the day hidden
in the forest, from the time when Fritz had
led me off, leaving Sapt with the princess.
Under cover of dusk, muffled up, I had been
brought to the Castle and lodged where I
now lay, Though three men had died
there--two of them by my hand,--I was not
troubled by ghosts. I had thrown myself on a
pallet by the window, and was looking out on
the black water; Johann the keeper, still pale
from his wound, but not much hurt besides,
had brought me supper. He told me that the
'king was doing well, that he had seen the
princess; that she and he, Sapt and Fritz, had
been long together. Marshal Strakencz gone
to Strelsau: Black Michael lay in his coffin,
and de Mauban watched by him; had I not
heard, the chapel, priests singing mass for
him?

Outside there were strange rumours afloat.
Some said that prisoner of Zenda was dead;
some, that he had vanished 'yet alive; some,
that he was a friend who had served the king
well in some adventure in England; others,
that he had dis-covered the duke's plots, and
had therefore been kidnapped by him. One
or two shrewd fellows shook their heads and
said only that they would say nothing, but
they had suspicions that more was to be
known than was known, if Colonel Sapt
would tell all he knew.

Thus Johann chattered till I sent him away
and lay there alone, thinking, not of the
future, but--as a man is wont to do when
stirring things have happened to him--
rehearsing the events of the past weeks, and
wondering how strangely they had fallen out.
And above me, in the stillness of the night, I

heard the standards flapping against their
poles, for Black Michael's banner hung there
half-mast high, and above it the royal flag of
Ruritania, floating for one night more over
my head. Habit grows so quick, that only by
an effort did I recollect that it floated no
longer for me.

Presently Fritz von Tarlenheim came into the
room. I was standing then by the window;
the glass was opened, and I was idly
fingering the cement which clung to the
masonry where "Jacob's Ladder" had been.
He told me briefly that the king wanted me,
and together we crossed the drawbridge and
entered the room that had been Black
Michael's.

The king was lying there in bed; our doctor
from Tarlenheim was in attendance on him,
and whispered to me that my visit must be
brief. The king held out his hand and shook
mine. Fritz and the doctor withdrew to the
window.

I took the king's ring from my finger and
placed it on his.

"I have tried not to dishonour it, sire," said I.

"I can't talk much to you," he said, in a weak
voice. "I have had a great fight with Sapt and
the marshal--for we have told the marshal
everything. I wanted to take you to Strelsau
and keep you with me, and tell everyone of
what you had done; and you would have
been my best and nearest friend, Cousin
Rudolf. But they tell me I must not, and that
the secret must be kept--if kept it can be."

"They are right, sire. Let me go. My work
here is done."

"Yes, it is done, as no man but you could have
done it. When they see me again, I shall have
my beard on; I shall--yes, faith, I shall be
wasted with sickness. They will not wonder
that the king looks changed in face. Cousin, I
shall try to let them find him changed in
nothing else. You have shown me how to
play the king."

"Sire," said I, "I can take no praise from you.
It is by the narrowest grace of God that I was
not a worse traitor than your brother."

He turned inquiring eyes on me; but a sick
man shrinks from puzzles, and he had no
strength to question me. His glance fell on
Flavia's ring, which I wore. I thought he
would question me

about it; but, after fingering it idly, he let his
head fall on his pillow.

"I don't know when I shall see you again," he
said faintly, almost listlessly.

"If I can ever serve you again, sire,"  I
answered.

His eyelids closed. Fritz came with the doctor.
I kissed the king's hand, and let Fritz lead me
away. I have never seen the king since.

Outside, Fritz turned, not to the right, back
towards the drawbridge, but to the left, and,
without speaking, led me upstairs, through a
handsome corridor in the  _i_ cha^teau _i_.

"Where are we going?" I asked. Looking away
from me, Fritz answered:

"She has sent for you. When it is over, come
back to the bridge. I'll wait for you there."

"What does she want?" said I, breathing
quickly. He shook his head.

"Does she know everything?"

"Yes, everything."

He opened a door, and gently pushing me in,
closed it behind me. I found myself in a
drawing-room, small and richly furnished. At
first I thought that I was alone, for the light
that came from a pair of shaded candles on
the mantelpiece was very dim. But presently
I discerned a woman's figure standing by the
window. I knew it was the princess, and I
walked up to her, fell on one knee, and
carried the hand that hung by her side to my
lips. She neither moved nor spoke. I rose to
my feet, and, piercing the gloom with my
eager eyes, saw her pale face and the gleam
of her hair, and before I knew, I spoke softly:

"Flavia!"

She trembled a little, and looked round. Then
she darted to me, taking hold of me.

"Don't stand, don't stand! No, you mustn't!
You're hurt! Sit down--here, here!"

She made me sit on a sofa, and put her hand
on my forehead

"How hot your head is," she said, sinking on
her knees by me. Then she laid her head
against me, and I heard her murmur:

"My darling, how hot your head is!"

Somehow love gives even to a dull man the
knowledge of his lover's heart. I had come to
humble myself and pray pardon for my
presumption; but what I said now was: "I
love you with all my heart and soul!"?

For what troubled and shamed her? Not her
love for me, but the fear that I had
counterfeited the lover as I had acted the
king, and taken her kisses with a smothered
smile.

"With all my life and heart!" said I, as she
clung to me. "Always, from the first moment
I saw you in the Cathedral! There has been
but one woman in the world to me--and there
will be no other. But God forgive me the
wrong I've done you!"

"They made you do it!" she said quickly; and
she added, raising her head and looking in
my eyes: "It might have made no difference if
I'd known it. It was always you, never the
king!" and she raised herself and kissed me.

"I meant to tell you," said I. "I was going to on
the night of the ball in Strelsau, when Sapt
interrupted me. After that, I couldn't--I
couldn't risk losing you before--before--I
must! My darling, for you I nearly left the
king to die!"

"I know, I know! What are we to do now,
Rudolf?"

I put my arm round her and held her up
while I said: "I am going away to-night."

"Ah, no, no!" she cried. "Not to-night!'

"I must go to-night, before more people have
seen me. And how would you have me stay,
sweetheart, except--?"

"If I could come with you!" she whispered
very low.

"My God!" said I roughly, "don't talk about
that!" and I thrust her a little back from me.

"Why not? I love you. You are as good a
gentleman as the king!"

Then I was false to all that I should have held
by. For I caught her in my arms and prayed
her, in words that I will not write, to come
with me, daring all Ruritania to take her from
me. And for a while she listened, with
wondering, dazzled eyes. But as her eyes
looked on me, I grew ashamed, and my voice
died away in broken murmurs and
stammerings, and at last I was silent.

She drew herself away from me and stood
against the wall, while I sat on the edge of the
sofa, trembling in every limb, knowing what
I had done--loathing it, obstinate not to undo
it. So we rested a long time.

"I am mad!" I said sullenly.

"I love your madness, dear," she answered.

Her face was away from me, but I caught the
sparkle of a tear on her cheek. I clutched the
sofa with my hand and held myself there.

"Is love the only thing?" she asked, in low,
sweet tones that seemed to bring a calm even
to my wrung heart. "If love were the only
thing, I would follow you--in rags, if need
be--to the world's end; for you hold my heart
in the hollow of your hand! But is love the
only thing?"

I made her no answer. It gives me shame now
to think that I would not help her.

She came near me and laid her hand on my
shoulder. I put my hand up and held hers.

"I know people write and talk as if it were.
Perhaps, for some, Fate lets it be. Ah, if I
were one of them! But if love had been the
only thing, you would have let the king die in
his cell."

I kissed her hand.

"Honour binds a woman too, Rudolf. My
honour lies in being true to my country and
my House. I don't know why God has let me
love you; but I know that I must stay."

Still I said nothing; and she, pausing a while,
then went on:

"Your ring will always be on my finger, your
heart in my heart, the touch of your lips on
mine. But you must go, and I must stay.
Perhaps I must do what it kills me to think of
doing."

I knew what she meant, and a shiver ran
through me. But I could not utterly fail beside
her. I rose and took her hand.

"Do what you will, or what you must," I said.
"I think God shows his purposes to such as
you. My part is lighter; for your ring shall be
on my finger and your heart in mine, and no
touch save of your lips will ever be on mine.
So, may God comfort you, my darling!"

There struck on our ears the sound of singing.
The priests in the chapel were singing masses
for the souls of those who lay dead. They
seemed to chant a requiem over our  buried
joy, to pray forgiveness for our love that
would not die. The soft, sweet, pitiful music
rose and fell as we stood opposite one
another, her hands in mine.

"My queen and my beauty!" said I.

"My lover and true knight!" she said.
"Perhaps we shall never see one another
again. Kiss me, my dear, and go!"

I kissed her as she bade me; but at the last
she clung to me, whispering nothing but my
name, and that over and over again--and
again--and again; and then I left her.

Rapidly I walked down to the bridge. Sapt
and Fritz were waiting for me. Under their
directions I changed my dress, and muffling
my face, as I had done more than once
before, I mounted with them at the door of
the Castle, and we three rode through the
night and on to the breaking of day, and
found ourselves at a little roadside station
just over the border of Ruritania. The train
was not quite due, and I walked with them in
a meadow by a little brook while we waited
for it. They promised to send me all  news;
they overwhelmed me with kindness--even
old Sapt was touched to gentleness, while
Fritz was half-unmanned. I listened in a kind
of dream to all they said.  "Rudolf! Rudolf!
Rudolf!" still rang in my ears--a burden of
sorrow and of love. At last they saw that I
could not heed them, and we walked up and
down in silence, till Fritz  touched me on the
arm, and I saw, a mile or more away, the blue
smoke of the train. Then I held out a hand to
each of them.

"We are all but half-men this morning," said
I, smiling. "But we have been men, eh, Sapt
and Fritz, old friends? We have run a good
course between us."

"We have defeated traitors and set the king
firm on his throne," said Sapt.

Then Fritz von Tarlenheim suddenly, before I
could discern his purpose or stay him,
uncovered his head and bent as he used to
do, and kissed my hand; and, as I snatched it
away, he said, trying to laugh:

"Heaven doesn't always make the right men
kings!"

Old Sapt twisted his mouth as he wrung my
hand.

"The devil has his share in most things," said
he.

The people at the station looked curiously at
the tall man with the muffled face, but we
took no notice of their glances. I stood with
my two friends, and waited till the train came
up to us. Then we shook hands again, saying
nothing; and both this time--and, indeed,
from old Sapt it  seemed strange--bared their
heads, and so stood still till the train bore me
away from their sight. So that it was thought
some great man travelled privately for his
pleasure from the little station that morning;
whereas, in  truth, it was only I, Rudolf
Rassendyll, an English gentleman, a cadet of
a good house, but a man of no wealth nor
position, nor of much rank. They would have
been disappointed to know that. Yet had they
known all, they would have looked more
curiously still. For, be I what I might now, I
had been for three months a king; which, if
not a thing to be proud of, is at least an
experience to have undergone. Doubtless I
should have thought more of it, had there not
echoed through the air, from the towers of
Zenda that we were leaving far away, into my
ears and into my heart the cry of a woman's
love--"Rudolf! Rudolf! Rudolf!"

Hark! I hear it now!

CHAPTER XXII  PRESENT, PAST--AND
FUTURE?

THE details of my return home can have but
little interest. I went straight to the Tyrol and
spent a quiet fortnight--mostly on my back,
for a severe chill developed itself; and I was
also the victim of a nervous reaction, which
made me weak as a baby. As soon as I had
reached my quarters, I sent an apparently
careless postcard to my brother, announcing
my good health and prospective return. That
would serve to satisfy the enquiries as to my
whereabouts, which were probably still
vexing the Prefect of the Police of Strelsau. I
let my moustache and imperial grow again;
and as hair comes quickly on my face, they
were respectable, though not luxuriant, by
the time that I landed myself in Paris and
called on my friend George Featherly. My
interview with him was chiefly remark-able
for the number of unwilling but necessary
falsehoods that I told; and I rallied him
unmercifully when he told me that he had
made up his mind that I had gone in the track
of Madame de Mauban to Strelsau. The lady,
it appeared, was back in Paris but was living
in great seclusion--a fact for which gossip
found no difficulty in accounting. Did not all
the world know of the treachery and death of
Duke Michael? Nevertheless,  George bade
Bertram Bertrand be of good cheer, "for," said
he flippantly, "a live poet is better than a
dead duke." Then he turned on me and
asked:

"What have you been doing to your
moustache?"

"To tell the truth," I answered, assuming a sly
air, "a man now and then has reasons for
wishing to alter his appearance. But it's
coming on very well again."

"What? Then I wasn't so far out! If not the
fair Antoinette, there was a charmer?"

"There is always a charmer," said I,
sententiously.

But George would not be satisfied till he had
wormed out of me (he took much pride in his
ingenuity) an absolutely imaginary
love-affair, attended with the proper  _i_
soupcon _i_  of scandal, which had kept me
all this time in the peaceful regions of the
Tyrol. In return for this narrative, George
regaled me with a great deal of what he
called "inside information" (known only to
diplomatists), as to the true course of events
in Ruri-tania, the plots and  counter-plots. In
his opinion, he told me, with a significant
nod, there was more to be said for Black
Michael than the public supposed; and he
hinted at a well-rounded suspicion that the
mysterious prisoner of Zenda,  concerning
whom a good many paragraphs had
appeared, was not a man at all, but (here I
had some ado not to smile) a woman
disguised as a man; and that strife between
the king and his brother for this imaginary
lady's favour was at the bottom of their
quarrel.

"Perhaps it was Madame de Mauban herself,"
I suggested.

"No!" said George decisively. "Antoinette de
Mauban was jealous of her, and betrayed the
duke to the king for that reason. And, to
confirm what I say, it's well known that the
Princess Flavia is now extremely cold to the
king, after having been most affectionate."

At this point I changed the subject, and
escaped from George's "inspired" delusions.
But if diplomatists never know anything
more than they had succeeded in finding out
in this instance, they appear to me to be
somewhat expensive luxuries.

While in Paris I wrote to Antoinette, though I
did not venture to call upon her. I received in
return a very affecting letter, in which she
assured me that the king's generosity and
kindness, no less than her regard for me,
bound her conscience to absolute secrecy. She
expressed the intention of settling in the
country, and withdrawing herself entirely
from society. Whether she carried out her
designs, I have never heard; but as I have not
met her, or heard news of her up to this time,
it is probable that she did. There is no doubt
that she was deeply attached to the Duke of
Strelsau; and her con-duct at the time of his
death proved that no knowledge of the man's
real character was enough to root her regard
for him out of her heart.

I had one more battle left to fight--a battle
that would, I knew, be severe, and was
bound to end in my complete defeat. Was I
not back from the Tyrol, without having
made any study of its inhabitants,
institutions, scenery, fauna, flora, or other
features? Had I not simply wasted my time in
my usual frivolous, good-for-nothing way?
That was the aspect of the matter which, I
was obliged to admit, would present itself to
my sister-in-law; and against a verdict based
on such evidence, I had really no defence to
offer. It may be supposed, then, that I
presented myself in Park Lane in a
shame-faced, sheepish fashion. On the
whole, my reception was not so alarming as I
had feared. It turned out that I had done, not
what Rose wished, but--the next best
thing--what she prophesied. She had declared
that I should make no notes, record no
observa-tions, gather no materials. My
brother, on the other hand, had been weak
enough to maintain that a really serious
resolve had at length animated me.

When I returned empty-handed, Rose was so
occupied in triumphing over Burlesdon that
she let me down quite easily, devoting the
greater part of her reproaches to my failure to
advertise my friends of my whereabouts.

"We've wasted a lot of time trying to find
you," she said.

"I know you have," said I. "Half our
ambassadors have led weary lives on my
account. George Featherly told me so. But
why should you have been anxious? I can
take care of myself."

"Oh, it wasn't that," she cried scornfully;"but I
wanted to tell you about Sir Jacob Borrodaile.
You know, he's got an  Embassy--at least he
will have in a month--and he wrote to say he
hoped you would go with him."

"Where's he going to?"

"He's going to succeed Lord Topham at
Strelsau," said she. "You couldn't have a nicer
place, short of Paris."

"Strelsau! H'm!" said I, glancing at my
brother.

"Oh, that doesn't matter? exclaimed Rose,
impatiently. "Now, you will go, won't you?"

"I don't know that I care about it!"

"Oh, you're too exasperating!"

"And I don't think I can go to Strelsau. My
dear Rose, would it be--suitable?"

"Oh, nobody remembers that horrid old story
now."

Upon this, I took out of my pocket a portrait
of the King of Ruritania. It had been taken a
month or two before he ascended the throne.
She could not miss my point when I said,
putting it into her hands:

"In case you've not seen, or not noticed, a
picture of Rudolf V., there he is. Don't you
think they might recall the story, if I
appeared at the Court of Ruritania?"

My sister-in-law looked at the portrait, and
then at me.

"Good gracious!" she said, and flung the
photograph down on the table.

"What do you say, Bob?" I asked.

Burlesdon got up, went to a corner of the
room, and searched in a heap of newspapers.
Presently he came back with a copy of the
Illustrated London News. Opening the
paper, he displayed a double-page engraving
of the Coronation of Rudolf V. at Strelsau.
The photograph and the picture he laid side
by side. I sat at the table fronting them; and,
as I looked, I grew absorbed. My eye
travelled from my own portrait to Sapt, to
Strakencz, to the rich robes of the Cardinal,
to Black Michael's face, to the stately figure
of the princess by his side. Long I looked and
eagerly. I was roused by my brother's hand
on my shoulder. He was gazing down at me
with a puzzled expression.

"It's a remarkable likeness, you see," said I. "I
really think I had better not go to Ruritania."

Rose, though half convinced, would not
abandon her position.

"It's just an excuse," she said pettishly. "You
don't want to do anything. Why, you might
become an ambassador!"

"I don't think I want to be an ambassador,"
said I.

"It's more than you ever will be," she
retorted.

That is very likely true, but it is not more
than I have been. The idea of being an
ambassador could scarcely dazzle me. I had
been a king!

So pretty Rose left us in dudgeon; and
Burlesdon, lighting a cigarette, looked at me
still with that curious gaze.

"That picture in the paper--" he said.

"Well, what of it? It shows that the King of
Ruritania and your humble servant are as
like as two peas."

My brother shook his head.

"I suppose so," he said. "But I should know
you from the man in the photograph."

"And not from the picture in the paper?"

"I should know the photograph from the
picture: the picture's very like the
photograph, but--"

"Well?"

"It's more like you," said my brother.

My brother is a good man and true--so that,
for all that he is a married man and mighty
fond of his wife, he should know any secret
of mine. But this secret was not mine, and I
could not tell it to him.

"I don't think it's so much like me as the
photograph," said I boldly. "But, anyhow,
Bob, I won't go to Strelsau."

"No, don't go to Strelsau, Rudolf," said he.

And whether he suspects anything, or has a
glimmer of the truth, I do not know. If he
has, he keeps it to himself, and he and I
never refer to it. And we let Sir Jacob
Borrodaile find another  _i_ attache' _i_.

Since all these events whose history I have
set down happened, I have lived a very quiet
life at a small house which I have taken in
the country. The ordinary ambitions and aims
of men in my position seem to me dull and
unattractive. I have little fancy for the whirl
of society, and none for the jostle of politics.
Lady Burlesdon utterly despairs of me; my
neighbours think me an indolent,  dreamy,
unsociable fellow. Yet I am a young man; and
sometimes I have a fancy--the superstitious
would call it a presentiment--that my part in
life is not yet altogether played; that,
somehow and some day, I shall mix again in
great affairs, I shall again spin policies in a
busy brain, match my wits against my
enemies', brace my muscles to fight a good
fight and strike stout blows. Such is the tissue
of my thoughts as, with gun or rod in hand, I
wander through the woods or by the side of
the stream. Whether the fancy will be
fulfilled, I cannot tell--still  less whether the
scene that, led by memory, I lay for my new
exploits will be the true one--for I love to see
myself once again in the crowded streets of
Strelsau, or beneath the frowning keep of the
Castle of Zenda. Thus led, my broodings
leave the future, and turn back on the past.
Shapes rise before me in long array--the wild
first revel with the king, the rush with my
brave tea-table, the  night in the moat, the
pursuit in the forest: my friends and my foes,
the people who learnt to love and honour me,
the desperate men who tried to kill me. And,
from amidst  these last, comes one who alone
of all of them yet moves on earth, though
where I know not, yet plans (as I do not
doubt) wickedness, yet turns women's hearts
to softness and men's to fear and hate. Where
is young Rupert of Hentzau--the boy who
came so nigh to beating me? When his name
comes into my head, I feel my hand grip and
the blood move quicker through my veins:
and the hint of Fate--the
presentiment--seems to grow stronger and
more definite, and to whisper insistently in
my ear that I have yet a hand to play with
young Rupert; therefore I exercise myself in
arms, and seek to put off the day when the
vigour of youth must leave me. One break
comes every year in my quiet life. Then I go
to Dresden, and there I am met by my dear
friend and companion, Fritz von Tarlenheim.
Last time, his pretty wife Helga came, and a
lusty crowing baby with her. And for a week
Fritz and I are together, and I hear all of what
falls out in Strelsau; and in the evenings, as
we walk and smoke together, we talk of Sapt,
and of the king, and often of young Rupert;
and, as the hours grow small, at last we speak
of Flavia. For every year Fritz carries with
him to Dresden a little box; in it lies a red
rose, and round the stalk of the rose is a slip
of paper with the words written:
"Rudolf--Flavia--always." And the like I send
back by him. That message, and the wearing
of the rings, are all that now bind me and the
Queen of Ruritania. For--nobler, as I hold
her, for the act--she has followed where her
duty to her country and her House led her,
and is the wife of the king, uniting his
subjects to him by-the love they bear to her,
giving peace and quiet days to thousands by
her self-sacrifice. There are moments when I
dare not think of it, but there are others when
I rise in spirit to where she ever dwells; then I
can thank God that I love the noblest lady in
the world, the most gracious and beautiful,
and that there was nothing in my love that
made her fall short in her high duty.

Shall I see her face again--the pale face and
the glorious hair? Of that I know nothing;
Fate has no hint, my heart no presentiment. I
do not know. In this world, perhaps--nay, it is
likely--never. And can it be that somewhere,
in a manner whereof our flesh-bound minds
have no apprehension, she and I will be
together again, with  nothing to come
between us, nothing to forbid our love? That
I know not, nor wiser heads than mine. But if
it be never--if I can never hold sweet
converse again with her,  or look upon her
face, or know from her her love; why, then,
this side the grave, I will live as becomes the
man whom she loves; and, for the other side,
I must pray a dreamless sleep.


[End.]