The prisoner of Zenda
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 armchair, 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 will
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 today.”
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 horses 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 for your
Majesty’s arrival, for there’ll be no one here to meet us yet. And
meanwhile--”
“Meanwhile,” said I, “the King’ll 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 tonight!”
“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 5
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 awaiting me, at their head
a tall old man, covered with medals, and of military bearing. 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 proceeded 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 aide-de-camp, 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
cookshop, 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