A prince of lovers

THE man to whom Ferdinand turned in his perplexity was one Eugen Morvan. It was he who had practically set him on the throne, since he had been the instigator of the course of intrigue which had rendered possible the coup by which the crown had been seized. A fat, sensual looking man of five and forty, one who, to the Church’s certain advantage, had stopped just short of becoming a priest, and, having thrown aside his deacon’s cassock, had, by devious paths, found his way to the Court, there, by luck, assurance, an easy-going philosophy and assiduous flattery, to attach himself to the person and fortunes of the Prince who stood next but one to the throne.

That his patron should be so nearly a power, and yet be none, was of itself enough to make it certain that the intriguing, insinuating spirit at his elbow would never rest from prompting him to amend the accident of birth. And when the idea had been accepted and the scheme launched, Morvan had proved that his lazy, self-indulgent exterior masked a spirit of daring conception and resource. He was ambitious, too, from, of course, the most material of worldly considerations. He had a bad man’s lust for power; power for evil, for selfish ends, for the gratification of every whim, from revenge to appetite. To have attempted to attach himself to Ludwig would have been absolutely futile. Bad men are keenly sensitive to their affinities and their antipathies. Ludwig would never have looked at that unctuous, knavish face but to order it from his court. Morvan knew that well, and hated him accordingly. Besides, to the rightful heir to the throne he could have been of no possible use. There could be no call there for the intriguing arts by which he sought to make himself indispensable. But when once he had Ferdinand committed to the scheme of usurpation—which, by an unlooked-for piece of luck, Ludwig’s mysterious absence so strangely favoured—that Prince was in his power; bound to him body and soul. Ferdinand dared not go back when the evil genius at his side urged him forward, and the result had indeed justified the confidence of the daring pilot who had seized the helm of his fortune.

“He is found.”

Morvan had guessed it already. “I was sure of it, sire. Nothing else could have brought that ruffian to Court.”

Briefly, not without a sign of agitation, Ferdinand told what he had heard. It was the way of his shrewd adviser never to make light of dangers, however insignificant, lest he should lose the credit of surmounting them. So his face was grave as he listened.

“So the crisis has come at last,” he observed, with an air of confidence in his ability to meet it. “The time for final action has arrived. It is well. You have acted wisely, sire, in caging the wild beast. What is to be the next move?”

Morvan was far too shrewd to force his advice gratuitously upon his patron, knowing if he held back his counsel it would be surely demanded. And when he gave it, it was cleverly done with an air of merely amplifying his master’s suggestions and putting them into practical shape.

“It is on that,” Ferdinand answered, “that I must have your advice. We must tread warily now.”

“Your Majesty’s first steps have been cautious to admiration,” Morvan returned, with what seemed a half sneering laugh in his eye. “Yes. We have the game in hand, so far. We must be careful not to throw away the advantage.”

“We can hardly employ this desperado to put him out of the way, and recognise the service by receiving him at our Court.”

The speech was tentative; Morvan, though he so understood it, tactfully ignored the tone.

“Your Majesty has rightly seen that course would be preposterous,” he replied craftily. “Happily, there is no need for it. Yes; it would indeed be a false step to put yourself in the power of that unprincipled bravo. You would never be safe for an hour. But we—that is, your Majesty’s position is strong enough without running such a monstrous risk. The Ministers are yours, the Court is yours, the army is yours, and I make bold to assert from positive knowledge, from trusty reports, that the people are yours. What, then, is left for Ludwig, supposing, as is scarcely probable, that he has not already fallen a victim to that wolf’s fangs?”

“But, if not, he is still to be feared.”

Morvan’s look was darkly significant. “It will be our fault if ever he is in a position to trouble us.”

Ferdinand’s cunning eyes met the other’s responsively. “Then what better means could we employ than this discredited outlaw; the most natural and irresponsible instrument——?”

“And the most dangerous,” Morvan put in, pursing his lips and shaking his head. “Say we give him a free hand, and dangle royal favour before him. We should attach to the Court a restless, scheming, ambitious spirit, the utterly unscrupulous holder of a dangerous secret, and, above all, a man of whom the constant sight would be hateful to your Majesty. And to attempt to put him out of sight would be full of risk. No! For butcher’s work, one must live the life of a butcher. Blood is no sure cement for keeping on a crown. We have no Rollmar here, and so may well abjure his methods.”

“Our scheme and victory have so far been bloodless,” said Ferdinand meditatively.

“Long may they remain so,” replied his counsellor, heartily. “No, sire, I have a better plan than this brigand’s.”

“Ah, yes?”

“If, as we believe, the people are with you it is because you have gained a popularity which the absent one has forfeited. The greater fool he. Ludwig has got himself into an awkward corner; we know nothing of that. Let him extricate himself from the tiger’s den as best he can. It will be certainly difficult, perhaps impossible, if report speaks truly of the Teufelswald tiger’s methods. It might, perhaps, even be politic to send, not too soon, a small expedition to his rescue. It will look generous, and the mob loves generosity—in others—much as it disrelishes the quality inside its own skin. Who knows? Supposing our dear cousin should be rescued alive; he is Quixotic; terms may be made; at worst the expedition can do your Majesty no harm. But if the whisper of foul play should spread, as it would like wildfire, I would not wager on the crown being on your head that day week.”

Ferdinand had brightened as he listened; doubtless he was relieved at the necessity for blood-guiltiness being set aside. And he felt that the alternative plan was shrewd, too.

“My dear Eugen, you are wonderful,” he exclaimed, fervently. “Yes; we will follow your advice. Ludwig is scarcely in a position to be formidable, and it will be our fault if we let him become so. And in the meantime, we keep the Count where his knowledge cannot leak out?”

A look came over Morvan’s face which showed that the mild course he had advised did not altogether spring from his character. “It might be well,” he said, with a touch of brutal significance, “to shut his mouth for ever. Anyhow, having caught and caged the ferocious brute, it would be madness to let him out again. And—yes, his life is many times forfeit. He may as well pay the penalty. No harm in that. It would be a popular stroke.”

As the Count’s fate was thus shortly decided, a second and even yet more extraordinary message than that which had announced him was brought to the King. No less a person than the Princess Ruperta of Waldavia had arrived at the Palace and was urgently asking an audience. After the first sense of astonishment, Ferdinand came shrewdly to connect this visit with his cousin’s fate, though the relation was not easy to see. Morvan was of the same opinion, as, at the King’s invitation, he accompanied him to the room where the interview was to take place.

To Ruperta the first anxious glance at the two men was unprepossessing enough. It was, however, no time to be influenced by impressions. The desperate chance of saving her lover filled her thoughts, as, raising herself from a suppliant’s obeisance, she stood in her splendid beauty before Ferdinand. He, looking at her with eyes which could see nothing else, spoke a few words of gracious welcome, and inquired to what he owed the honour of her visit and how he could serve her, while Morvan’s dark, unfathomable gaze was unnoticed, as he stood speculating how this turn might be or not be to his advantage.

The story was soon told; it was already known to its hearers, but it was Morvan who was the quicker to comprehend that the teller was unaware of her lover’s real name and rank. It was astounding, for a while almost incredible, but it gradually forced itself upon his conviction. Ferdinand was puzzled, and a trifle less quick at divining the truth; he once had on his tongue the words which would have opened her eyes, but his confidant, alertly on the watch, interposed so significantly that he suddenly understood.

“It is to your Majesty that in my extremity I have turned,” poor Ruperta pleaded, perhaps with failing hope, as she looked at the usurper’s face with its utter absence of magnanimity. “There is no help or hope for me in my own land. If my father would befriend us, Rollmar would not let him; for the servant, I shame to speak it, though it is well known, is more powerful than his master. He hates me, and has marked down for death the man I love; it is the fate of all who cross his path.”

“He designed your hand, Princess, for our cousin Ludwig, unhappily lost or dead, did he not?” Ferdinand observed, disguising the object of his question under an appearance of sympathetic interest.

“It was,” she replied, “his abominable disregard for my happiness that drove me from my home. It was that also, I imagine, that made Prince Ludwig a wanderer, since he seems to detest this scheme of Rollmar’s as much as I.”

“Then, Princess, you have no idea as to what became of poor Ludwig; whether he be living or dead? You have never seen him?” Ferdinand asked, in simulated concern.

“I have never seen Prince Ludwig. He has taken care of that,” she answered, with a trace of bitterness. “He need not have feared,” she added proudly. “There was no need to efface himself from human knowledge. But perhaps, if he imagined me so poor a thing as to be a puppet in Rollmar’s hands, he was right to run any risk to avoid me.”

“He knows not what he has missed,” said Ferdinand, with greedy admiration. “Happily, perhaps, he will never know it now.”

“He is dead?” she asked, with womanly regret.

“There is little doubt of it.”

“And the man on whose account I have come to plead with you?” she urged. “The subject and soldier of your Majesty, who has braved Rollmar and faced more than once the death prepared for him; you will not let him die?”

The covetous eyes were feasting on her beauty, flushed as it was with the eagerness of entreaty. He roused himself from his preoccupation of contemplating her face to answer her words.

“Not if we can help it. But, you know, Princess, that Count Irromar is no easy man to deal with.”

“That is true. Yet surely the King of Beroldstein is stronger than he?”

“Let us hope so,” he said mechanically, as he followed out Ludovic’s stratagem and its reason.

“You say Rollmar is already there with a force?” Morvan put in. “And he could not help you?”

“To rescue the man whose death he constantly seeks? Scarcely. It is from him that I have fled.”

“From Rollmar?”

“He has designs upon my liberty. Perhaps—who knows?—upon my life, too, rather than that I should bring his scheme to naught.”

“And so,” Ferdinand said, eagerly, “you have come to me for protection as well. It will be no less a pleasure than an honour to me to afford you an asylum, my Princess, though in so doing I provoke the ill-will of a powerful neighbour and put myself at issue with the most pitiless spirit in Europe. You have appealed to my chivalry, cousin; you have claimed my protection and help; I lay them all, and myself, at your feet.”

He advanced, and with an excess of gallantry, bent low and kissed her hand. It seemed as though his touch chilled her; perhaps she felt instinctively that he was false; knew, woman-like, that her cause appealed to him less than her beauty. But in her desperate eagerness, she could not stay to weigh that. It was enough for the moment that she could compel his interest.

“Every hour,” she urged, as his lips touched her hand, “every moment is precious, since this brave life hangs on it. I know how unreasonable is my request, but my joy would be great in proportion if your Majesty would speak the word of rescue.”

“We will take measures at once,” Ferdinand assured her, with a show of alacrity. But he seemed as though he could not take his eyes from her; a poor guarantee that he would exert himself in her lover’s interest. Morvan, watching him, read his mind, and laughed to himself.

It was quickly arranged that Ruperta should be lodged at the house of one of the principal ladies of the Court, and thither she was escorted with the respect due to her rank, Ferdinand, as he took his leave of her, reiterating the assurance of his readiness to serve her, which was so far from his intention.

When he was left alone with Morvan, the evil eyes of the two schemers met in mutual understanding. As Ferdinand seemed to hang back from declaring his thoughts and purposes, his henchman, reading them surely, led the way.

“A royal Princess, indeed,” he observed, with unctuous enthusiasm. “You might do worse, sire, than to acquire your cousin’s bride as well as his crown.”

“I was thinking so,” the reply came with ready eagerness. “That alliance would do more to settle me firmly on the throne than any other conceivable plan.”

“It would at once and for ever ensure the support of Rollmar.”

“It would. And with that, our position would be strength itself.”

“Quite unassailable. The old fox wants the crowns united. For the flesh and blood that happen to wear them he cares nothing. I rejoice, sire, that chance has thrown in your way an opportunity as glorious as it is unexpected.”

Not a word would the crafty counsellor speak of the most urgent factor, his master’s personal feelings. He was sure enough of them.

“And Ludwig?”

As he spoke the word, the King glanced with dark suggestion at his favourite.

Morvan gave a shrug and an evil laugh. “You must keep your word to the Princess, sire.”

Ferdinand read the mocking words by the light of the laugh. “While he lives——” he paused significantly.

“Yes,” said Morvan, following the thought, “Princess Ruperta is a resolute young woman. I think it might be well to release Count Irromar with a hint. With Rollmar for a close ally, even that dare-devil ceases to be a danger.”