"I thought you had forgotten me," she said.
"Forget your highness? Do not give me credit for such an impossibility." He bowed over her hand and brushed it with his lips, for she was almost royal now. "Your highness will be happy. It is written." He stepped back slowly.
"Have you the gift of prescience?"
"In this instance. You will be a great queen."
"Who knows?" dreamily. "When I recall what I have gone through, all this seems like an enchantment out of a fairy-book, and that I must soon wake up in my garret in Dresden."
If only it might be an enchantment! he thought. If only he might find her as the grim old chancellor had found her, in a garret! What?
"Why did you do that?" she asked quickly.
"I do not understand."
"You shrugged."
"I beg your highness' pardon!" flushing. "I was not conscious of such rudeness."
"That is not answering my question."
"I beg of your highness—"
"My highness commands!" But her voice was gentle.
"It was a momentary dream I had; and the thought of its utter impossibility caused me to shrug. I assure your highness that it was a philosophical shrug, such as the Stoics were wont to indulge in." He spoke lightly. Only his eyes were serious.
"And this dream; was there not a woman in it?"
"Oh, no; there was only an angel."
She knew that it was not proper to question him in this manner; but neither her heart nor her mind were formal to-night.
"You interest me; you always interest me. You have seen so many wonderful things. And now it is angels."
"Only one, your Highness." This was daring. "But perhaps I am putting my foot where angels fear to tread," which was still more daring.
"Angels ought not to be afraid of anything." She laughed; there was a pain and a joy in the sound of it. She read his heart as one might read a written line.
"Dreams are always unfinished things," he said, getting back on safer ground.
"What is she like, this angel?" forcing him upon dangerous ground again wilfully.
"Who may describe an angel one has seen only in a golden dream?"
"You will not tell me?"
"I dare not!" His eyes sought hers unflinchingly. This moment he was mad, and had not the chancellor and Baron von Steinbock came up, Heaven only knew what further madness would have unbridled his tongue.
"Your Highness," began the benign voice of the chancellor, "the baron desires, in the name of his august master, to open the ball with you. Behold my fairy-wand," gaily. "This night I have made you a queen."
"Can you make me happy also?" said she, so low that only the chancellor heard her.
"I shall try. Ah, Herr Captain," with a friendly jerk of his head toward Carmichael; "will you do me the honor to join me in my cabinet, quarter of an hour hence?"
"I shall be there, your Excellency." Carmichael was uneasy. He was not certain how much the chancellor had heard.
"A little diplomatic business in which I shall need your assistance," supplemented the chancellor.
Carmichael, instead of loitering uselessly in the ball-room, at once sought the chancellor's cabinet. He wanted to be alone. He made known his business to the chancellor's valet who admitted him. He stopped just across the threshold. To his surprise the room was already tenanted. Grumbach and a police officer!
"Why, Grumbach, what are you doing here?" cried Carmichael.
"Waiting for his excellency. We have been here something past an hour."
"What's the trouble?" Carmichael inquired.
"Your excellency knows as much as I do," said the officer, who was in fact no less than the sub-chief of the bureau.
"And I am in the dark, also," said Grumbach, twirling his hat.
Carmichael walked about, studying the many curios. Occasionally Grumbach wiped his forehead, and, absently, the inner rim of his hat. Perhaps the three of them waited twenty minutes; then the chancellor came in. He bowed cordially and drew chairs about his desk. He placed Grumbach in the full glare of the lamp. Carmichael and the sub-chief were in the half-light. The chancellor was last to seat himself.
"Herr Grumbach," said the chancellor in a mild tone, "I should like to see your papers."
"My passports, your Excellency?"
"Yes."
Grumbach laid them on the desk imperturbably. The chancellor struck the bell. His valet answered immediately.
"Send Breunner, the head gardener, at once."
"He is in the anteroom, Excellency."
"Tell him to come in."
The chancellor shot a piercing glance at Grumbach, but the latter was studying the mural decorations.
Carmichael sat tight in his chair, curious to learn what it was all about. Breunner entered. He was thin and partly bald and quite fifty.
"Breunner, her highness will need many flowers to-morrow. See to it that they are cut in the morning."
"It shall be done, Excellency."
The chancellor turned to the passports.
"There is only one question, Herr Grumbach. It says here that you were a native of Bavaria before going to America. How long ago did you leave Bavaria?"
"A good many years, your Excellency." Grumbach inspected the label in his hat.
"You have, of course, retained your Bavarian passport?"
Carmichael was now leaning forward in his chair, deeply interested. He saw that the chancellor was watching Grumbach as a cat watches a mouse-hole.
Grumbach brought forth a bulky wallet. The edges of Bank of England notes could be seen, of fat denominations.
"Here it is, your Excellency; a little ragged, but readable still."
The chancellor went over it carefully.
"Herr Captain, do you know this compatriot?"
"We fought side by side in the American war. I saw no irregularity in his papers. I am rather astonished to see him here and not at the police bureau, if any question has arisen over his passports."
"Fought side by side," the chancellor repeated thoughtfully. "Then he is no stranger to you?"
"I do not say that. We were, however, in the same cavalry, only in different troops. Grumbach, you have your honorable discharge with you?"
Grumbach went into his wallet still again. This document the chancellor read with an interest foreign to the affair under his hand. Presently he laughed softly. Why, he could not readily have told.
"I am sorry, Herr Grumbach. All this unnecessary trouble simply because of the word Bavaria."
"No trouble at all, your Excellency," restoring his papers. "I have seen the inside of a real palace, and I never expected such an honor."
"How long will you be making your visit?"
"Only a few days, your Excellency. Then I shall proceed to Bavaria."
"Your excellency has no further orders?" said the head gardener patiently.
"Good Heaven, Breunner, I had forgotten all about you! There is nothing more. Gentlemen, your pardon for having detained you so long. Herr Captain, you will return with me to the ball-room?"
"If your excellency will excuse me, no. I am tired. I shall return to the hotel with Herr Grumbach."
"As you please. Good night."
The three left the cabinet under various emotions. The sub-chief bowed himself off at the gates, and Carmichael and Grumbach crossed the Platz leisurely.
"How did you come by that Bavarian passport?" asked Carmichael abruptly.
"It is a forgery, my friend, but his excellency will never find that out."
"You have me all at sea. Why did he bring in the head gardener and leave him standing there all that while?"
"He had a sound purpose, but it fell. The head gardener did not recognize me."
"Do you know him?"
"Yes. He is my elder brother."
CHAPTER VIII
THE KING'S LETTER
The ambassador from Jugendheit, Baron von Steinbock, was not popular in Dreiberg, at least not among the people, who still held to the grand duke's idea that the kingdom had been behind the abduction of the Princess Hildegarde. The citizens scowled at his carriage, they scowled at the mention of his name, they scowled whenever they passed the embassy, which stood in the heart of the fashionable residences in the König Strasse. Never a hot-headed Dreiberger passed the house without a desire to loot it, to scale the piked fence and batter in the doors and windows. Steinbock himself was a polished, amiable gentleman, in no wise meriting this ill-feeling. The embassy was in all manner the most important in Dreiberg, though Prussia and Austria overshadowed it in wealth and prestige.
At this moment the people gazed at the house less in rancor than in astonishment. The king of Jugendheit was to marry her serene highness! It was a bad business, a bad business; no good would come of it. The great duke was a weak man, after all.
The menials in and about the embassy felt the new importance of their positions. So then, imagine the indignation of the majordomo, when, summoned at dusk one evening to the carriage gates, three or four days after the portentous news had issued from the palace, he found only a ragged and grimy carter who demanded peremptorily to be admitted and taken to his excellency at once.
"Be off with you, ragamuffin!" growled the majordomo.
"Be quick; open the gates!" replied the carter, swinging his whip threateningly.
"Go away!" The majordomo spun on his heels contemptuously.
"I will skin you alive," vowed the carter, striking the iron with the butt of his whip, "if you do not open these gates immediately. Open!"
There was real menace this time. Could the fellow be crazy? The majordomo concluded to temporize.
"My good man," he said conciliatorily, "you have brains. You ought to know that his excellency will receive no man in your condition. If you do not stop hammering on those bars, I shall send for the police."
The carter thrust a hand through the grill. There was a ring on one of his fingers.
"Imbecile, set your eye on that and admit me without more ado!"
The majordomo was thunderstruck. Indeed, a blast from the heavens would have jarred him less.
"Open, then!"
The majordomo threw back the bolts and the carter pushed his way in. That ring on the carter's finger? The majordomo felt himself slipping into a fantastic dream.
"Take me to the baron."
Vastly subdued the majordomo preceded the carter into the office of the embassy. There he left the strange guest and went in search of the baron. The ambassador was in his study, reading.
"Your Excellency, there is a man in the office who desires to see you quickly."
The ambassador laid down his book. "Upon what pretense did he gain admittance at this hour?" he demanded.
"I refused him admittance, your Excellency, because he was dressed like a carter.—"
"A carter!" The ambassador wrathfully jumped to his feet.
"One moment, your Excellency. He wore a ring on his finger, and I could not refuse him."
"A ring, you say?"
Guarding his voice with his hand, the majordomo whispered two words.
"Here, and dressed like a carter? What the devil!" The ambassador rushed from the study.
It was dark in the embassy office. Quickly the ambassador lighted some candles. Gas would be too bright for such a meeting.
"Well, your Excellency?" said a voice from the leather lounge.
"Who are you?" For this was not the voice the baron expected to hear.
"My name at present does not matter. The news I bring is far more important. His majesty emphatically declines any alliance with the House of Ehrenstein."
The ambassador stumbled into a chair, his mind dulled, his shoulders inert. This was a blow.
"Declines?" he murmured.
"He repudiates his uncle's negotiations absolutely."
"Damnation!" swore the ambassador, coming to life once more.
"The exact word used by the prince; in fact, the word has become common property in the last forty-eight hours. Now then, what's to be done? What do you suggest?"
"This means war. The duke will never swallow such an insult."
"War! It looks as if you and I, Baron, shall not accompany the king of Prussia into Alsace-Lorraine. We shall have entertainment at home."
"This is horrible!"
"The devil of a muddle!"
"But what possessed the prince to blunder like this?"
"The prince really is not to blame. Our king, Baron, is a young colt. A few months ago he gave his royal uncle carte blanche to seek a wife for him. Politics demanded an alliance between Jugendheit and Ehrenstein. There have been too many years of useless antagonism. On the head of this bolt from Heaven comes the declaration of his majesty that he will marry any other princess on the continent."
"They will pull this place down, brick by brick!"
"Let them! We have ten thousand more troops than Ehrenstein."
"You young men are a pack of fools!"
"Softly, Baron."
"You would like nothing better than war."
"Unless it is peace."
"Where is the king?"
The carter smiled. "He is hunting, they say, with the crown prince of Bavaria."
"But you, why have you come dressed like this?"
"That is a little secret which I am not at liberty to disclose."
"But, great God, what's to be done?"
"Lie," urbanely.
"What good will lies do?"
"They will suspend the catastrophe till we are ready to meet it. The marriage is not to take place till spring. That will give us plenty of time. After the coronation his majesty may be brought to reason. This marriage must not fall through now. The grand duke will not care to become the laughing-stock of Europe. The prince's advice is for you to go about your affairs as usual. Only one man must be taken into your confidence, and that man is Herbeck. If any one can straighten out his end of the tangle it is he. He is a big man, of fertile invention; he will understand. If this thing falls through his honors will fall with it. He will work toward peace, though from what I have learned the duke would not shun war."
"Where is the prince?"
"Wherever he is, he is working for the best interests of the state. Don't worry about his royal highness; he's a man."
"When did you come?"
"This morning. Though I have been here before in this same guise."
"There is the Bavarian princess," remarked the ambassador musingly.
"Ha! A good thought! But the king is romantic; she is older than he, and ugly."
"You are not telling me everything," intuitively.
"I know it. I am telling you all that is at present necessary."
"You make me the unhappiest man in the kingdom! I have worked so hard and long toward this end. When did the king decline this alliance?"
"Evidently the moment he heard of it. I have his letter in my pocket. I am requested to read it to you. Listen:
"'MY ILLUSTRIOUS AND INDUSTRIOUS UNCLE: I regret exceedingly that at this late day I should cause you political embarrassment; but when I gave my consent to the espousal of any of the various princesses at liberty, surely it was understood that Ehrenstein was not to be considered. I refuse to marry the daughter of the man who privately strove to cover my father with contumely, who dared impute to him a crime that was any man's but my father's. I realize that certain policies called for this stroke on your part, but it can not be. My dear uncle, you have digged a fine pit, and I hope you will find a safe way out of it. I refuse to marry the Princess Hildegarde. This is final. It can be arranged without any discredit to the duke or to yourself. Let it be said that her serene highness has thrown me over. I shan't go to war about it.
"'FREDERICK.'"
"Observe 'My illustrious and industrious uncle'!" laughed the carter without mirth. "Our king, you will see, has a graceful style."
"Your tone is not respectful," warned the ambassador.
"Neither is the state of my mind. Oh, my king is a fine fellow; he will settle down like his father before him; but to-day—" The carter dropped his arms dejectedly.
"There is something going on."
"What, you are likely to learn at any moment. Pardon me, Baron, but if I dared I would tell you all. But his highness' commands are over me and I must obey them. It would be a mental relief to tell some one."
"Curse these opera-dancers!"
The carter laughed. "Aye, where kings are concerned. But you do him injustice. Frederick is as mild as Strephon." He gained his feet. He was young, pleasant of face, but a thorough soldier.
"You are Lieutenant von Radenstein!" cried the ambassador. "I recognize you now."
"Thanks, your Excellency!"
"You are in the royal household, the regent's invisible arm. I have heard a good deal about you. I knew your father well."
"Again, thanks. Now, the regent has heard certain rumors regarding an American named Carmichael, a consul. He is often seen with her highness. Rather an extraordinary privilege."
"Rest your mind there, Lieutenant. This Carmichael is harmless. You understand, her highness has not always been surrounded by royal etiquette. She has had her freedom too long not to grow restive under restraint. The American is a pleasant fellow, but not worth considering. Americans will never understand the ways of court life. Still, he is a gentleman, and so far there is nothing compromising in that situation. He can be eliminated at any time."
"This is reassuring. You will see the chancellor to-night and show him this letter?"
"I will, and God help us all to straighten out this blunder!"
"Amen to that! One word more, and then I'm off. If a butcher or a baker, or even a mountaineer pulls the bell-cord and shows this ring, admit him without fail. He will have vital news. And now, good night and good luck to your excellency."
For half an hour the ambassador remained staring at the candlesticks. By and by he resumed his chair. What should he do? Where should he begin? Suppose the chancellor should look at the situation adversely, from the duke's angle of vision, should the duke learn? There was but one thing to do and that was to go boldly to Herbeck and lay the matter before him frankly. Neither Jugendheit nor Ehrenstein wanted war. The chancellor was wise; it would be better to dally with the truth than needlessly to sacrifice ten thousand lives. But what had the lieutenant further to conceal? The ambassador wanted no dinner. He rang for his hat and coat, and twenty minutes later he was in the chancellor's cabinet.
"You seem out of health, Baron," was the chancellor's greeting.
"I am indeed that, Count. I received a letter to-day from the prince regent. It was sent to him by his majesty, who is hunting in Bavaria. Read it, Count, but I pray to you to do nothing hastily."
The chancellor did not open the letter, he merely balanced it. That so light a thing should be so heavy with dark portents! His accustomed pallor assumed a grayish tinge.
"So his majesty declines?" he said evenly. "You have already heard?" cried the amazed ambassador.
"Nothing; I surmise. The hour, your appearance, the letter—to what else could they point?
I was afraid all along. Strange instinct we have at times. The regent is to be pitied; he took too much for granted. He has been used to power one day too long. Ah, if his majesty could but see her, could only know how lovely she is in heart and mind and face! Is she not worthy a crown?"
"Herbeck, nothing would please me better, nothing would afford my country greater pleasure and satisfaction, than to see this marriage consummated. It would nail that baseless lie which has so long been current."
"I believe you. We two peoples should be friendly. It has taken me months to bring this matter round. The duke rebelled; her highness scorned the hand of Frederick. One by one I had to overcome their objections—to this end. The past refuses to be buried. Still, if you saw all the evidence in the case you would not blame the duke for his attitude."
"But those documents are rank forgeries!"
"So they may be, but that has not been proved."
"Why should his late majesty abduct the daughter of the grand duke? For what benefits? To what end? Ah, Count, if some motive could be brought forward, some motive that could stand!"
"Motives, my friend? They spring from the most unheard-of places. And motives in action are always based on impulses. But let us waste no time on retrospection. It is the present which confronts us. You do not want war."
"No more do you."
"I ask, nay, I plead that question of you."
"I represent the offended party." The chancellor's gaunt features lighted with a transient smile. "Proceed, Baron."
"I suggest, then, that the duke must not know."
"Agreed. Go on."
"You will put the matter before her highness."
"That will be difficult."
"Let her repudiate the negotiations. Let her say that she has changed her mind. His majesty is quite willing that the humiliation be his."
"That is generous. But suppose she has set her heart on the crown of Jugendheit? What then?"
The baron bit the ends of his mustache.
"Suppose that?" the chancellor pressed relentlessly.
"In that event, the affair is no longer in our hands but in God's."
"As all affairs are. Is there no way of changing the king's mind?"
"Read the letter, Count," said the ambassador.
Herbeck hunted for the postmark: Bavaria. He read the letter. There was nothing between the lines. It was the work of rather an irresponsible boy.
"May I take this to her highness?" asked the chancellor.
"I'm afraid—"
"I promise its contents will not go beyond her eye."
"I will take the risk."
"His majesty is very young," was the chancellor's comment.
"Young! He is a child. He has been in his palace twice in ten years. He is travel-mad. He has been wandering in France, Holland, England, Belgium. He tells his uncle to play the king till the coronation. Imagine it! And the prince has found this authority so pleasant and natural that he took it for granted that his majesty would marry whomever he selected for him. To have allowed us to go forward, as we have done, believing that he had the whole confidence of the king!"
Herbeck consulted his watch. It was half after six. Her highness did not dine till eight.
"I shall go to her highness immediately, Baron. I shall return the letter by messenger, and he will tell you the result of the interview."
"God be with you," said the ambassador, preparing to take his leave, "for all women are contrary."
After the baron was gone the chancellor paced the room with halting step. Then, toward the wraith of his ambition he waved a hand as if to explain how futile are the schemes of men. He shook himself free from this idle moment and proceeded to the apartments of her highness. Would she toss aside this crown, or would she fight for it? He found her alone.
"Well, my good fairy, what is in your magic wand to-night?" she asked. How fond she was of this great good man, and how lonely he always seemed!
He saluted her hand respectfully. "I am not a good fairy to-night, your Highness. On the contrary, I am an ogre. I have here a letter. I have given my word that its contents shall not be repeated to the duke, your father. If I let you read it, will you agree to that?"
"And who has written this letter?" non-committally.
"His majesty, the king of Jugendheit," slowly.
"A letter from the king?" she cried, curious. "Should it not be brought to me on a golden salver?"
"It is probable that I am bringing it to you at the end—of a bayonet," solemnly. "If the duke learns its contents the inevitable result will be war."
A silence fell upon them and grew. This was the bitterest moment but one in the chancellor's life.
"I believe," she said finally, "that it will not be necessary to read his majesty's letter. He declines the honor of my hand: is that not it?"
The chancellor signified that it was.
"Ah!" with a note of pride in her voice and a flash in her eyes. "And I?"
"You will tell the duke that you have changed your mind," gravely.
"Do princesses change their minds like this?"
"They have often done so."
"In spite of publicity?"
"Yes, your Highness."
"And if I refuse to change my mind?"
"I am resigned to any and all events."
"War." Her face was serious. "And what has the king to suggest?"
"He proposes to accept the humiliation of being rejected by you."
"Why, this is a gallant king! Pouff! There goes a crown of thistledown." She smiled at the chancellor, then she laughed. There was nothing but youth in the laughter, youth and gladness. "Oh, I knew that you were a good fairy. Listen to me. I declare to you that I am happier at this moment than I have been in days. To marry a man I have never seen, to become the wife of a man who is nothing to me, whose looks, character, and habits are unknown; why, I have lived in a kind of horror. You did not find me soon enough; there are yet some popular ideas in my head which are alien to the minds of princesses. I am free!" And she uttered the words as with the breath of spring.
The chancellor's shoulders drooped a trifle more, and his hand closed down over the letter. Otherwise there was no notable change in his appearance. He was always guarding the muscles of his face. Inscrutability is the first lesson of the diplomat; and he had learned it thirty years before.
"There will be no war," resumed her highness. "I know my father; our wills may clash, but in this instance mine shall be the stronger."
"But this is not the end."
"You mean that there will be other kings?" She had not thought of this, and some of the brightness vanished from her face.
"Yes, there will be other kings. I am sorry. What young girl has not her dream of romance? But princesses must not have romances. Yours, my child, must be a political marriage. It is a harsh decree."
"Have not princesses married commoners?"
"Never wisely. Your highness will not make a mistake like that."
"My highness will or will not marry, as she pleases. Am I a chattel, that I am to be offered across this frontier or that?"
The chancellor moved uneasily. "If your highness loved out of your class, which I know you do not, I should be worried."
"And if I did?" with a rebel tilt to her chin.
"Till that moment arrives I shall not borrow trouble. You will, then, tell the duke that you have changed your mind, that you have reconsidered?"
"This evening. Now, godfather, you may kiss her serene highness on the forehead."
"This honor to me?" The chancellor trembled.
"Even so."
He did not touch her with Ne hands, but the kiss he put on her forehead was a benediction.
"You may go now," she said, "for I shall need the whole room to dance in. I am free, if only for a little while!"
Outside the door the chancellor paused. She was singing. It was the same aria he had heard that memorable night when he found her in the dim garret.
CHAPTER IX
GRETCHEN'S DAY
Gretchen was always up when the morning was rosy, when the trees were still dark and motionless, and the beads of dew white and frostlike. For what is better than to meet the day as it comes over the mountains, and silence breaks here and there, in the houses and streets, in the fields and the vineyards? Let old age, which has played its part and taken to the wings of the stage, let old age loiter in the morning, but not green years. Gretchen awoke as the birds awoke, with snatches and little trills of song. To her nearest neighbors there was about her that which reminded them of the regularity of a good clock; when they heard her voice they knew it was time to get up.
She was always busy in the morning. The tinkle of the bell outside brought her to the door, and her two goats came pattering in to be relieved of their creamy burden. Gretchen was fond of them; they needed no care at all. The moment she had milked them they went tinkling off to the steep pastures.
Even in midsummer the dawn was chill in Dreiberg. She blew on her fingers. The fire was down to the last ember; so she went into the cluttered courtyard and broke into pieces one of the limbs she had carried up from the valley earlier in the season. The fire renewed its cheerful crackle, the kettle boiled briskly, and the frugal breakfast was under way.
There was daily one cup of coffee, but neither Gretchen nor her grandmother claimed this luxury; it was for the sick woman on the third floor. Sometimes at the Black Eagle she had a cup when her work was done, but to Gretchen the aroma excelled the taste. Her grandmother's breakfast and her own out of the way, she carried the coffee and bread and a hot brick up to the invalid. The woman gave her two crowns a week to serve this morning meal. Gretchen would have cheerfully done the work for nothing.
What the character of the woman's illness was Gretchen hadn't an idea, but there could be no doubt that she was ill, desperately, had the goose-girl but known it. Her face was thin and the bones were visible under the drum-like skin; her hands were merely claws. But she would have no doctor; she would have no care save that which Gretchen gave her. Sometimes she remained in bed all the day. She had been out of the house but once since she came. She mystified the girl, for she never complained, never asked questions, talked but little, and always smiled kindly when the pillow was freshened.
"Good morning, Fräu," said Gretchen.
"Good morning, Liebchen."
"I have brought you a brick this morning, for it will be cold till the sun is high."
"Thank you."
Gretchen pulled the deal table to the side of the cot, poured out the coffee, and buttered the bread.
"I ought not to drink coffee, but it is the only thing that warms me. You have been very patient with me."
"I am glad to help you."
"And that is why I love you. Now, I have some instructions to give you this morning. Presently I shall be leaving, and there will be something besides crowns."
"You are thinking of leaving?"
"Yes. When I go I shall not come back. Under my pillow there is an envelope. You will find it and keep it."
Gretchen, young and healthy, touched not this melancholy undercurrent. She accepted the words at their surface value. She knew nothing about death except by hearsay.
"You will promise to take it?"
"Yes, Fräu."
"Thanks, little gosling. I have an errand for you this morning. It will take you to the palace."
"To the palace?" echoed Gretchen.
"Yes. Does that frighten you?"
"No, Fräu; it only surprises me. What shall I do?"
"You will seek her highness and give her this note."
"The princess?" Gretchen sadly viewed her wooden shoes and roughened hands.
"Never mind your hands and feet; your face will open any gate or door for you."
"I have never been to the palace. Will they not laugh and turn me out?"
"If they try that, demand to see his excellency, Count von Herbeck, and say that you came from forty Krumerweg."
Gretchen shuddered with a mixture of apprehension and delight. To meet and speak to all these great ones!
"And if I can not get in?"
"You will have no trouble. Be sure, though, to give the note to no one but her highness. There will be no answer. All I ask is that when you return you will tell me if you were successful. You may go."
Gretchen put the note away and went down-stairs. She decked her beautiful head with a little white cap, which she wore only on Sundays and at the opera, and braided and beribboned her hair. It never occurred to her that there was anything unusual in the incident. It was only when she came out into the König Strasse that the puzzle of it came to her forcibly. Who was this old woman who thought nothing of writing a letter to her serene highness? And who were her nocturnal visitors? Gretchen had no patience with puzzles, so she let her mind revel in the thought that she was to see and speak to the princess whom she admired and revered. What luck! How smoothly the world was beginning to run!
Being of a discerning mind, she idled about the Platz till after nine, for it had been told to her that the great sleep rather late in the morning. What should she say to her serene highness? What kind of a curtsy should she make? These and a hundred other questions flitted through her head. At least she would wear no humble, servile air. For Gretchen was a bit of a socialist. Did not Herr Goldberg, whom the police detested, did he not say that all men were equal? And surely this sweeping statement included women! She attended secret meetings in the damp cellar of the Black Eagle, and, while she laughed at some of the articles in the propaganda, she received seriously enough that which proclaimed her the equal of any one. So long as she obeyed nature's laws and Heaven's, was she not indeed the equal of queens and princesses, who, it was said, did not always obey these laws?
With a confidence born of right and innocence, she proceeded toward the east or side gates of the palace. The sentry smiled at her.
"I have a letter for her serene highness," she said.
"Leave it."
"I am under orders to give it to her highness herself."
"Good day, then!" laughed the soldier. "You can not enter the gardens without a permit."
Gretchen remembered. "Will you send some one to his excellency the chancellor and tell him I have come from number forty Krumerweg?"
"Krumerweg? The very name ought to close any gate. But, girl, are you speaking truthfully?"
Gretchen exhibited the note. He scratched his chin, perplexed.
"Run along. If they ask me, I'll say that I didn't see you." The sentry resumed his beat.
Gretchen stepped inside the gates, and the real beauty of the gardens was revealed to her for the first time. Strange flowers she had never seen before, plants with great broad leaves, grass-like carpet, and giant ferns, unlike anything she had plucked in the valleys and the mountains. It was all a fairy-land. There were marble urns with hanging vines, and marble statues. She loitered in this pebbled path and that, forgetful of her errand. Even had her mind been filled with the importance of it, she did not know where to go to find the proper entrance.
A hand grasped her rudely by the arm.
"What are you doing here?" thundered the head gardener. "Be off with you! Don't you know that no one is allowed in here without a permit?"
Gretchen wrenched free her arm. She was angry.
"How dare you touch me like that?"
Something in her glance, which was singularly arrogant, cooled even the warm-blooded Hermann.
"But you live in Dreiberg and ought to know."
"You could have told me without bruising my arm," defiantly.
"I am sorry if I hurt you, but you ought to have known better. By which sentry did you pass?" for there was that about her beauty which made him suspicious regarding the sentry's imperviousness to it.
"Hermann!"
Gretchen and the head gardener whirled. Through a hedge which divided the formal gardens from the tennis and archery grounds came a young woman in riding-habit. She carried a book in one hand and a riding-whip in the other.
"What is the trouble, Hermann?" she inquired. "Your voice was something high."
"Your Highness, this young woman here had the impudence to walk into the gardens and stroll about as nice as you please," indignantly.
"Has she stolen any flowers or trod on any of the beds?"
"Why, no, your Highness; but—"
"What is the harm, then?"
"But it is not customary, your Highness. If we permitted this on the part of the people, the gardens would be ruined in a week."
"We, you and I, Hermann," said her highness, with a smile that won Gretchen on the spot, "we will overlook this first offense. Perhaps this young lady had some errand and lost her way."
"Yes, Highness," replied Gretchen eagerly.
"Your highness alone with—"
"Go at once," kindly, but with royal firmness.
Hermann bowed, gathered up his pruning knives and scissors which he had let fall, and stalked down the path. What was it? he wondered. She was a princess in all things save her lack of coldness toward the people. It was wrong to meet them in this way, it was not in order. Her highness had lived too long among them. She would never rid herself of the idea that the humble had hearts and minds like the exalted.
As the figure of the head gardener diminished and shortly vanished behind a bed of palms, her highness laughed brightly, and Gretchen, to her own surprise, found herself laughing also, easily and without constraint.
"Whom were you seeking?" her highness asked, rather startled by the undeniable beauty of this peasant.
"I was seeking your serene highness. I live at number forty the Krumerweg, and the sick woman gave me this note for you."
"Krumerweg?" Her highness reached for the note and read it, and as she read tears gathered in her eyes. "Follow me," she said. She led Gretchen to a marble bench and sat down. Gretchen remained on her feet respectfully. "What is your name?"
She led Gretchen to a marble bench and sat down.
"Gretchen, Highness."
"Well, Gretchen, sit down."
"In your presence, Highness?" aghast.
"Don't bother about my presence on a morning like this. Sit down."
This was a command and Gretchen obeyed with alacrity. It would not be difficult, thought Gretchen, to love a princess like this, who was not only lovely but sensible. The two sat mutely. They were strangely alike. Their eyes nearly matched, their hair, even the shape of their faces. They were similarly molded, too; only, one was slender and graceful, after the manner of fashion, while the other was slender and graceful directly from the hands of nature. The health of outdoors was visible in their fine skins and clear eyes. The marked difference lay, of course, in their hands. The princess had never toiled with her fingers except on the piano. Gretchen had plucked geese and dug vegetables with hers. They were rough, but toil had not robbed them of their natural grace.
"How was she?" her highness asked.
"About the same, Highness."
"Have you wondered why she should write to me?"
"Highness, it was natural that I should," was Gretchen's frank admission.
"She took me in when nobody knew who I was, clothed and fed me, and taught me music so that some day I should not be helpless when the battle of life began. Ah," impulsively, "had I my way she would be housed in the palace, not in the lonely Krumerweg. But my father does not know that she is in Dreiberg; and we dare not tell him, for he still believes that she had something to do with my abduction." Then she stopped. She was strangely making this peasant her confidante. What a whim!
"Highness, that could not be."
"No, Gretchen; she had nothing to do with it." Her highness leveled her gaze at the flowers, but her eyes saw only the garret or the barnlike loneliness of the opera during rehearsals.
Gretchen did not move. She saw that her highness was dreaming; and she herself had dreams.
"Do you like music?"
"Highness, I am always singing."
"La-la—la!" sang the princess capriciously.
"La-la—la!" sang Gretchen smiling. Her voice was not purer or sweeter; it was merely stronger, having been accustomed to the open air.
"Brava!" cried the princess, dropping book and whip and folding the note inside the book. "Who taught you to sing?"
"Nobody, highness."
"What do you do?"
"I am a goose-girl; in the fall and winter I work at odd times in the Black Eagle."
"The Black Eagle? A tavern?"
"Yes, Highness."
"Tell me all about yourself."
This was easy for Gretchen; there was so little.
"Neither mother nor father. Our lives are something alike. A handsome girl like you must have a sweetheart."
Gretchen blushed. "Yes, Highness. I am to be married soon. He is a vintner. I would not trade him for your king, Highness," with a spice of boldness.
Her highness did not take offense; rather she liked this frankness. In truth, she liked any one who spoke to her on equal footing; it was a taste of the old days when she herself could have chosen a vintner and married him, with none to say her nay. Now she was only a pretty bird in a gilded cage. She could fly, but whenever she did so she blundered painfully against the bright wires. If there was any envy between these two, it existed in the heart of the princess only. To be free like this, to come and go at will, to love where the heart spoke! She surrendered to another vagrant impulse.
"Gretchen, I do not think I shall marry the king of Jugendheit."
Gretchen grew red with pride. Her highness was telling her state secrets!
"You love some one else, Highness?" How should a goose-girl know that such a question was indelicate?
Her highness did not blush; the color in her cheeks receded. She fondled the heart-shaped locket which she invariably wore round her throat. That this peasant girl should thus boldly put a question she herself had never dared to press!
"You must not ask questions like that, Gretchen."
"Pardon, Highness; I did not think." Gretchen was disturbed.
But the princess comforted her with: "I know it. There are some questions which should not be asked even by the heart."
This was not understandable to Gretchen; but the locket pleased her eye. Her highness, observing her interest, slipped the trinket from her neck and laid it in Gretchen's hand.
"Open it," she said. "It is a picture of my mother, whom I do not recollect having ever seen. Wait," as Gretchen turned it about helplessly.
"I will open it for you." Click!
Gretchen sighed deeply. To have had a mother so fair and pretty! She hadn't an idea how her own mother had looked; indeed, being sensible and not given much to conjuring, she had rarely bothered her head about it. Still, as she gazed at this portrait, the sense of her isolation and loneliness drew down upon her, and she in her turn sought the flowers and saw them not. After a while she closed the locket and returned it.
"So you love music?" picking up the safer thread.
"Ah, yes, Highness."
"Do you ever go to the opera?"
"As often as I can afford. I am very poor."
"I will give you a ticket for the season. How can I reward you for bringing this message? Don't have any false pride. Ask for something."
"Well, then, Highness, give me an order on the grand duke's head vintner for a place."
"For the man who is to become your husband?"
"Yes, Highness."
"You shall have it to-morrow. Now, come with me. I am going to take you to Herr Ernst. He is the director of the opera. He rehearses in the court theater this morning."
Gretchen, undetermined whether she was waking or dreaming, followed the princess. She was serenely unafraid, to her own great wonder. Who could describe her sensations as she passed through marble halls, up marble staircases, over great rugs so soft that her step faltered? Her wooden shoes made a clatter whenever they left the rugs, but she stepped as lightly as she could. She heard music and voices presently, and the former she recognized. As her highness entered the Bijou Theater, the Herr Direktor stopped the music. In the little gallery, which served as the royal box, sat several ladies and gentlemen of the court, the grand duke being among them. Her highness nodded at them brightly.
"Good morning, Herr Direktor."
"Good morning, your Highness."
"I have brought you a prima donna," touching Gretchen with her whip.
The Herr Direktor showed his teeth; her highness was always playing some jest.
"What shall she sing in, your Highness? We are rehearsing The Bohemian Girl."
The chorus and singers on the little stage exchanged smiles.
"I want your first violin," said her highness.
A youth stood up in the orchestral pit.
"Now, your Highness?" said the Herr Direktor.
"Try her voice."
And the Herr Direktor saw that she was not smiling. He bade the violinist to draw his bow over a single note.
"Imitate it, Gretchen," commanded her highness; "and don't be afraid of the Herr Direktor or of the ladies and gentlemen in the gallery."
Gretchen lifted her voice. It was sweeter and mellower than the violin.
"Again!" the Herr Direktor cried, no longer curious.
Without apparent effort Gretchen passed from one note to another, now high, now low, or strong or soft; a trill, a run. The violinist, of his own accord, began the jewel song from Faust. Gretchen did not know the words, but she carried the melody without mishap. And then, I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls. This song she knew word for word, and ah, she sang it with strange and haunting tenderness! One by one the musicians dropped their instruments to their knees. The grand duke in the gallery leaned over the velvet-buffered railing. All realized that a great voice was being tried before them. The Herr Direktor struck his music-stand sharply. It was enough.
"Your highness has played a fine jest this day. Where does madame your guest sing, in Berlin or Vienna?"
"In neither," answered her highness, mightily gratified with Gretchen's success. "She lives in Dreiberg, and till this morning I doubt if I ever saw her before."
The Herr Direktor stared blankly from her highness to Gretchen, and back to her highness again. Then he grasped it. Here was one of those moments when the gods make gifts to mortals.
"Can you read music?" he asked.
"No, Herr," said Gretchen.
"That is bad. You have a great voice, Fräulein. Well, I shall teach you. I shall make you a great singer. It is hard work."
"I have always worked hard."
"Good! Your Highness, a thousand thanks! What is your name?" to Gretchen. She told him. "It is a good name. Come to me Monday at the opera and I shall put you into good hands. Some day you will be rich, and I shall become great because I found you."
Then, with the artist's positive indifference to the presence of exalted blood, he turned his back upon the two young women and roused his men from the trance.
"So, Gretchen," said her highness, when the two came out again into the garden, "you are to be rich and famous. That will be fine."
"Thanks, Highness, thanks! God grant the day to come when I may be of service to you!" Gretchen kissed the hands of her benefactress.
"Whenever you wish to see the gardens," added the princess, "the gates will be open for you."
As Gretchen went back to the Krumerweg her wooden shoes were golden slippers and her rough homespun, silk. Rich! Famous! She saw the opera ablaze with lights, she heard the roll of applause. She saw the horn of plenty pouring its largess from the fair sky. Rainbow dreams! But Gretchen never became a prima donna. There was something different on the knees of the gods.
CHAPTER X
AFFAIRS OF STATE
The grand duke stamped back and forth with a rumble as of distant thunder. He would search the very deeps of this matter. He was of a patient mold, but this was the final straw. He would have his revenge if it upset the whole continent. They would play with him, eh? Well, they had loosed the lion this time. He had sent his valet to summon her highness and Herbeck.
"And tell them to put everything else aside."
He kneaded the note in his hand powerfully. It was anonymous, but it spoke clearly like truth. It had been left with one of the sentries, who declared that a small boy had delivered it. The sender remained undiscoverable.
His highness had just that hour returned from the military field. He was tired; and it was not the psychological moment for a thing like this to turn up. Had he not opposed it for months? And now, having surrendered against his better judgment, this gratuitous affront was offered him! It was damnable. He smote the offending note. He would soon find out whether it was true or not. Then he flung the thing violently to the floor. But he realized that this burst of fury would not translate the muddle, so he stooped and recovered the missive. He laughed, but the laughter had a grim Homeric sound. War! Nothing less. He was prepared for it. Twenty thousand troops were now in the valley, and there were twenty thousand reserves. What Franz Josef of Austria or William of Prussia said did not amount to the snap of his two fingers. To avenge himself of the wrongs so long endured of Jugendheit, to wipe out the score with blood! Did they think that he was in his dotage, to offer an insult of this magnitude? They should see, aye, that they should! It did not matter that the news reached him through subterranean channels or by treachery; there was truth here, and that sufficed.
"Enter!" he cried, as some one knocked on the door.
Herbeck came in, as calm, as imperturbable as ever.
"Your highness sent for me?"
"I did. Why the devil couldn't you have left well enough alone? Read this!" flinging the note down on his desk.
Herbeck picked it up and worked out the creases. When he had read to the final word, his hand, even as the duke's, closed spasmodically over the stiff paper.
"Well?" The query tingled with rage.
The answer on the chancellor's lips was not uttered. Hildegarde came in. She blew a kiss at her father, who caught the hand and drew her toward him. He embraced her and kissed her brow.
"What is it, father?"
Herbeck waited.
"Read," said the duke.
As the last word left Herbeck's lips, she slipped from her father's arms and looked with pity at the chancellor.
"What do you think of this, Hildegarde?"
"Why, father, I think it is the very best thing in the world," dryly.
"An insult like this?" The duke grew rigid. "You accept it calmly, in this fashion?"
"Shall I weep and tear my hair over a boy I have never seen? No, thank you. I was about to make known to you this very evening that I had reconsidered the offer. I shall never marry his majesty."
"A fine time!" The duke's hand trembled. "Why, in God's name, did you not refuse when the overtures were first made? The truth, Herbeck, the whole truth; for there is something more than this."
Herbeck, in few words and without evasion, explained the situation.
"Your Highness, the regent is really not to blame, for his majesty had given him free rein in the matter; and his royal highness, working as I have been for the best interests of the two countries, never dreamed that the king would rebel. All my heart and all my mind have been working toward this end, toward a greater peace and prosperity. The king has been generous enough to leave the publicity in our hands; that is to say, he agrees to accept the humiliation of being rejected by her serene highness."
"That is very generous of him!" said the duke sarcastically. "Send for Ducwitz."
"Ducwitz, your Highness?" cried the chancellor, chilled.
"Immediately!"
"Father!"
"Must I give an order twice?"
"Your Highness, if you call Ducwitz I shall surrender my portfolio to you." The chancellor spoke without anger, quietly but firmly.
"Do so. There are others to take up your work." The duke, for the moment, had thrown reason to the winds. Revenge, the clamor of revenge, was all the voice he heard.
The chancellor bowed, turned to leave the room, when Hildegarde flew to the duke's side and snatched at his sleeve.
"Father, you are mad!"
"At least I am master in Ehrenstein. Herbeck, you will have the kindness to summon General Ducwitz."
"Your Highness," replied Herbeck, "I have worked long and faithfully in your service. I can not recollect that I ever asked one personal favor. But I do so now. Do not send for Ducwitz to-night. See him in the morning. This is no time for haste. You will throw the army into Jugendheit, and there will follow a bloody war. For I have to inform you that the prince regent, recognizing the false position he is in, has taken the ram by the horns. His troops are already bivouacked on the other side of the pass. This I learned to-day. He will not strike first; he will wait for you."
"I will have my revenge!" stubbornly.
"Father, listen to me. I am the affronted person; I, I alone, have the right to say what shall be done in the matter. And I say to you if you do these cruel things, dismiss his excellency and bring war and death to Ehrenstein, I will never forgive you, never, never! You are wrong, wrong, and I, your daughter, tell you so frankly. Leave it to me. There will be neither war nor humiliation."
As the duke gazed at her the wrath gathering in his throat receded and his admiration grew. His daughter! She was a princess, indeed, as she stood there, fearless, resolute, beautiful. And her very beauty gave recurrence to his wrath. A fool of a king he was, a fool of a king!
"My dear child," he said, "I have suffered too much at the hands of Jugendheit. It was my daughter the first time; it is my honor now," proudly.
"Will it balance war and devastation?" the girl asked quietly. "Is it not pride rather than honor? The prince regent made a pardonable blunder. Do not you, my father, make an unpardonable one. The king is without blame, for you appeal to his imagination as a man who deeply wronged his father. I harbor no ill-feeling against him or his uncle, because I look at the matter from an impersonal point of view; it was for the good of the state. This blunder can be undone; therefore it is not wise to double it, to make it irreparable."
"A Portia to the judgment!" said the chancellor, his eye kindling. "Let it all rest upon my shoulders. I alone am to blame. It was I who first suggested the alliance. We all have dreams, active or passive, futile or purposeful. My ambition was to bring about a real and lasting peace. Your Highness, I have failed signally. There is nothing to do now but to appoint my successor." All the chancellor's force and immobility of countenance gave way, and he looked the broken man.
Notwithstanding that he was generally hasty, the duke was a just man. In his heart of hearts he understood. He offered his hand, with half a smile; and when he smiled he was a handsome old man.
"You are bidding me farewell, your Highness?" said Herbeck.
"No, Count. I would not let you go for half my duchy. What should I do without your solid common sense? No; remain; we are both of us too old to quarrel. Even a duke may be a fool sometimes."
Herbeck laid his cold hand upon the duke's. Then he went over to her highness and kissed her hand gratefully, for it was truly at her feet the wreath of victory lay.
"Highness," he said softly, "you are the fairest, finest princess in the world, and you shall marry when you will."
"And where?"
"I would that I could make it so. But there is a penalty for being placed so high. We can not change this unwritten law."
"Heaven did not write it," she replied.
"No, my daughter," said the duke. "Man is at the bottom of all the kinks and twists in this short life; not Heaven. But Herbeck is right; you shall marry when you will."
She sprang into his arms and kissed him. It was, however, a traitorous kiss; for she was saying in her heart that now she would never marry. Herbeck's eyes wandered to the portrait over the fireplace. It was the girl's mother.
The knock of the valet was again heard.
"Your Highness, there is a young woman, a peasant, who desires to speak to her serene highness."
"Where is she?" asked the duke.
"She is outside, your Highness."
"What! She enters the palace without any more trouble than this?"
"By my orders, father," said Hildegarde, who gathered that this privileged visitor must be Gretchen of the Krumerweg. "Admit her."
"Truly we are becoming socialists," said the duke, appealing to Herbeck, who replied with his usual grim smile.
Gretchen was ushered in. Her throat was a little full as she recognized the three most important persons in the grand duchy. Outwardly she was composed. She made a curtsy to which the duke replied with his most formal bow of state. The sparkle of amusement was in his eyes.
"The little goose-girl!" he said half-audibly.
"Yes, Highness." Gretchen's face was serious and her eyes were mournful. She carried an envelope in her hand tightly.
"Come to me, Gretchen," said the princess.
"What is it?"
Gretchen's eyes roamed undecidedly from the duke to Herbeck.
"She is dead, Highness, and I found this letter under her pillow."
It was Herbeck's hand that took the envelope. But he did not open it at once.
"Dead?" Hildegarde's eyes filled.
"Who is dead?" demanded the duke.
"Emma Schultz, father. Oh, I know you will forgive me for this deception. She has been in Dreiberg for a month, dying, and I have often stolen out to see her." She let her tears fall unrestrained.
The duke stared at the rug. Presently he said: "Let her be buried in consecrated ground. Wrong or right, that chapter is closed, my child, and I am glad you made her last moments happy. It was like you. It was like your mother. What is in the letter, Herbeck?"
Herbeck was a strong man; he was always far removed from tears; but there was a mist over the usual clarity of his vision. He ripped down the flap. It was only a simple note to her serene highness, begging her to give the enclosed banknotes to one Gretchen who lived in the Krumerweg. The notes represented a thousand crowns.
"Take them, little goose-girl," said the duke; "your ship has come in. This will be your dowry."
An icy shiver ran up and down Gretchen's spine, a shiver of wonder, delight, terror. A thousand crowns! A fortune!
"Hold out your hand," requested Herbeck. One by one he laid the notes on the goose-girl's hand. "This is only a just reward for being kind and gentle to the unfortunate."
"And I shall add to it another thousand," said Hildegarde. "Give them to me, father."
In all, this fortune amounted to little more than four hundred dollars; but to Gretchen, frugal and thrifty, to whom a single crown was a large sum, to her it represented wealth. She was now the richest girl in the lower town. Dreams of kaleidoscopic variety flew through her head. Little there was, however, of jewels and gowns. This vast sum would be the buffer between her and hunger while she pursued the one great ambition of her life—music. She tried to speak, to thank them, but her voice was gone. Tears sprang into her eyes. She had the power to do no more than weep.
The duke was the first to relieve the awkwardness of the moment.
"Count, has it not occurred to you that we stand in the presence of two very beautiful young women?"
Herbeck scrutinized Gretchen with care; then he compared her with the princess. The duke was right. The goose-girl was not a whit the inferior of the princess. And the thing which struck him with most force was that, while each possessed a beauty individual to herself, it was not opposite, but strangely alike.
The goose-girl had returned to her gloomy Krumerweg, the princess had gone to her apartments, and Herbeck to his cabinet. The duke was alone. For a long period he stood before the portrait of his wife. The beauties of his courtship trooped past him; for God had given to the grand duke of Ehrenstein that which He denies most of us, high or low, a perfect love.
"Always, always, dear heart," he whispered; "in this life and in the life to come. To love, what is the sickle of death?"
He passed on to his secretary and opened a drawer. He laid a small bundle on the desk and untied the string. One by one he ranged the articles; two little yellow shoes, a little cloak trimmed with ermine. There had been a locket, but that was now worn by her highness.