The Second Seal Page 11

  The ship plunged, rolled and staggered in a horrid corkscrew motion. The force of the rain made it rebound in a thousand little fountains from the deck. Thunder rolled and lightning forked from the black sky above. But Ilona sat on entranced, exclaiming with delight at every flash.

  The roaring of the storm would have drowned any attempt at conversation, so they sat there in silence while the rain streamed in rivulets from their hats and shoulders. It was not until nearly four o’clock that the downpour eased a little, and by then they were due to sight Ostend harbour, ahead through the murk, at any moment.

  Having glanced at his watch, Adam Grünne pushed the sopping rug from off his knees, and stood up. “We are due in at four-fifteen,” he announced. “So, with your Highness’ permission, I will go below, find one of my bags, and get into some dry clothes.”

  “Of course, Adam,” she smiled. “It was thoughtless of me to have kept you here during the downpour, but I did suggest that you should take shelter just as it was starting.” She turned then to the Duke.

  “Perhaps you would also like to put on dry things before we land. If so, please have no scruples about leaving me here alone.”

  He made her a little bow. “I thank your Imperial Highness for your consideration; but I have often been soaked to the skin while on my campaigns and taken no harm from it.”

  As Count Grünne left them, the rain declined to a gusty splutter, and a break in the clouds showed to the east. But the sea continued to hiss angrily, occasionally slapping hard against the side of the ship.

  A few minutes later Ilona disentangled herself from her coverings and rose to her feet. “I want,” she said, “to see the last of these lovely waves before we get in.” And she started to walk towards the rail.

  De Richleau had risen with her, and as soon as they reached the ship’s side, by looking round the canvas screen, they could see the piers of Ostend harbour. Both knew that the voyage was nearly over, and neither had so far made any direct reference to their previous meeting. As they leaned side by side on the rail, she suddenly turned to him and asked:

  “Did you invent that story about the butterfly as a symbol for myself, and really feel like that about me?”

  “Of course, Princess,” he replied gravely. “I swear to you that nothing in the world could have caused me more distress than the thought that I had wantonly taken advantage of your innocence and shattered the serenity of your mind.”

  “It … it was a shock … a very grave one; because nothing like that has ever happened to me before. But it had to happen sometime, and it has changed me quite a lot.”

  “Not for the worse, I hope.”

  “No. It caused me to realise that, because I had not been brought up like other girls, there is no reason why I should not act like them, providing that I always bear in mind the responsibilities of my position.”

  “May I take it that I am forgiven, then?”

  “Do you give me your word that you really had no idea who I was?’

  “I swear it. I knew only that chance had thrown into my path the most lovely person I have seen in a lifetime.”

  She turned to look at him again, and her eyes were kind. “You said something about being on your way to Belgrade, did you not? That is only a night’s journey from Vienna. If you really want my forgiveness, come and ask for it there. I promise nothing; but you may even find that the mentors of a poor, imprisoned princess have not yet quite succeeded in turning her heart into stone.”

  Chapter VII

  City of Delight

  Two special coaches had been attached to the Orient Express to accommodate the Archduchess’ party; but de Richleau did not take advantage of his temporary acceptance as one of her entourage to travel in one. He took formal leave of her and her companions immediately they landed, with the excuse that, as he was passing through Ostend, he had arranged to meet a man in the station restaurant for a brief business conference, and she did not suggest that he should rejoin them later.

  He was glad of that, as on the train they would have had no further opportunity to be alone together, and he felt reluctant to blur the memory of that moment when they had leaned side by side on the rail of the ship. Moreover, he wanted to be alone. His mind was in a turmoil, and as soon as he had made himself comfortable in his sleeper he settled down to think matters out.

  It was now clear that by kissing Ilona Theresa he had done much more to her than was usually conveyed by that quite ordinary act. He had changed her from a docile girl to a rebellious woman overnight. The Countess Aulendorf’s remarks at luncheon had been ample evidence of that. Moreover, she had as good as invited him to Vienna, on what could be only a pretext to cover the fact that she wanted to see him again. But why? Could it really be because Her Imperial Highness was now thinking of him as her gallant—in fact, as ready to play the part he had offered to assume while still unaware of her identity. He wondered for a moment if he was flattering himself unduly, but there seemed to be no other explanation. Her last words had been a pathetic cry for just such a friendship—perhaps even for a lover.

  Staring straight ahead, as the train roared through a tunnel, the Duke shifted on his seat. Nobody knew better than he the implications of such a role. If he occupied it, the affair might end for both of them in tragedy. In any case he would court the gravest danger. There was no blinking the fact that she was over-ripe for a first love, so a spring having been touched that had released her long pent-up emotions she might soon prove capable of any rashness. Should she become so, and any man be caught making love to her in her own country, it would certainly go hard with him. Initial detection in a ballroom flirtation would result in no more than an order to quit Vienna forthwith, but if the affair went further, and love letters to her were discovered, or she was surprised while keeping a secret rendezvous, however innocent, her gallant would find himself cooling his heels in a fortress. So it was certainly not the sort of amorous adventure to be undertaken lightly.

  De Richleau began to review the little he knew about her. She had been telling the truth when she had told him at the masked ball that her mother was a Belgian, but she had said nothing of her father, except that he was dead, and the manner of his death was probably a subject that she never talked about. In fact, it was doubtful if she had ever heard the full details of the tragedy herself. As she had been born posthumously it would have been already half-buried in the past by the time she was old enough to be told about it, and then it had probably been thought desirable to spare her all but the bare facts.

  Her father had been the ill-fated Crown Prince Rudolph, only son of the Emperor Franz Joseph and the Empress Elizabeth. All accounts agreed that he had been a handsome and intelligent young man, but much given to secretiveness and introspection. His young wife, the Archduchess Stephanie, was devoted to him, and he returned her affection, although guilty of those temporary infidelities, the temptation to indulge in which is offered to good-looking young princes far more frequently than to other men. Such a state of affairs being by no means unusual in royal circles, neither his parents nor his friends had any reason to feel particularly concerned on his account until it was too late and the tragedy had come, like a bolt from the blue, upon them.

  From the letters he left for his family, and the evidence of the servants whom he had made his only confidants, it emerged that from about the age of twenty-eight he had been beset by an uncontrollable urge to indulge his passions with low-class women of evil repute. Yet, in between these lapses, so disgusted did he feel with himself at conduct so disgraceful in an Emperor’s son, that he contemplated taking his own life. For a little over two years he continued alternatively to follow his secret pursuit of vice and brood morbidly on suicide; but he had a terrible fear of death and could not bring himself to face the great unknown alone.

  He then met the Baroness Marie Vetsera, a beautiful and romantic young girl of seventeen, who fell passionately in love with him and became his mistress. It was supposed that he had confi
ded his desperate thoughts to her, and out of her great love for him she had agreed to face death at his side. In any case, he had excused himself from a family dinner party on the plea of illness, in order to take her to his hunting lodge at Mayerling. On the following morning his valet could get no reply when he knocked on the bedroom door. The man called the Crown Prince’s equerry and together they broke the door down. Inside, they found the girl lying dead on the bed, with a bullet through her head and a rose clasped in her folded hands. Rudolph was seated on a chair beside her, and on the floor nearby lay the revolver with which he had blown out his brains.

  De Richleau wondered how much the morbid mentality of the Empress Elizabeth had contributed to the derangement of her son; and if Ilona Theresa had in turn inherited these terrible tendencies. But there seemed nothing in the least morbid about her, and perhaps she had escaped the strain of madness that had so often proved the curse of those in whose veins ran the blood of the Wittlesbachs. He fervently hoped so; for he knew already that he was in love with her.

  He knew that it was absurd that, after only two brief meetings, a man of his experience should feel as he did about a girl to whom passion was still a closed book. But there it was! There was no accounting for the genesis of such emotions, like a thief in the night, they stole upon one unawares. On one day one did not even know of the existence of some person of the opposite sex, or had known them for half a lifetime without seeing any particular quality in them; and the next, one’s every thought was coloured by the desire to please and be near them. Lack of serious concern for their well-being was insensibly transformed overnight into an imperative urge to protect them from all harm and bring them joy, to squander one’s money and neglect one’s work sooner than see them unhappy, if need be, to risk one’s health, position, reputation and ties with family and friends rather than sacrifice all hope of union with this one being who, out of all the millions that swarmed upon the surface of the earth, now seemed unique.

  The Duke sighed, gave a little shrug of his shoulders, then smiled. Of course he would seek a meeting with her in Vienna. He had known that from the very moment she suggested he might do so.

  Now, he admitted to himself, he felt much happier in his mind. The fact that he would be entering on a difficult and dangerous game began to intrigue him. He was used to taking risks, and more serious ones than the possibility of landing in a fortress. It would be fun to pit his wits against the guardians of the gilded cage that held the beautiful Ilona. But he would have to go warily—very warily—on her account even more than on his own.

  There was, too, his mission to be thought of. He must not allow a love affair to prejudice his chances of succeeding in that. Therefore, there must be no climbing of the walls of Imperial gardens in the middle of the night. In fact, no act which could result in worse than his expulsion from Vienna—at least until he had got all he could out of Dimitriyevitch.

  In any case he had intended to pay a visit to Vienna as soon as he had had a chance to assess the general lie of the land in the Serbian capital. It took two to make a quarrel, and it was Austria whom the conspirators of the Black Hand planned to provoke. Therefore he thought it very important to form an appreciation of what Austrian reactions were likely to be.

  Everyone agreed that the ancient Dual Monarchy, weakened as it was by the separatist aspirations of the numerous races who composed its population, would run a certain risk of disintegrating should it become involved in a major war. If the Austrians believed that Russia would support Serbian demands by force of arms, they might well hesitate before accepting a Serbian challenge. Unless they could count with absolute certainty on German backing, they might consider that it would prove cheaper in the long run to surrender Bosnia to the Serbs, and also let them have a port on the Adriatic. In that case it was probable that the Black Hand’s next move would be against Greece, with the object of seizing Salonika, and thus securing a second outlet, to the East. If so, the next war would be no more than another Balkan squabble, and the hopes of preserving the general peace of Europe be good. On the other hand, Austrian pride would certainly be ruffled by the insolence of her small neighbour, and that might lead to a public demand for instant chastisement. In the event, the issue would depend on the mentalities of the few men who controlled the destinies of Austria. Were they far-sighted? And were they strong enough to resist a popular outcry? These were matters which, from the beginning, de Richleau had felt it incumbent on him to find out.

  As he thought about it, he realised that his second meeting with Ilona Theresa would greatly facilitate his investigation in Vienna. He already had several acquaintances with houses there, but some of them might be abroad, or on their country estates. Anyway, it would have taken some little time before their introductions could have gained him access to Court circles, whereas now he could call upon the Count and Countess Aulendorf, who, in view of their appointment, must be persona grata with all the members of the Imperial family; and Count Adam Grünne who, he had learned at lunch, was the grandson of General Count Grünne, the Comptroller of the Emperor’s Household in the days when Franz Joseph was still a young man.

  Soon after the train crossed the German frontier, the Duke went along to the restaurant car for dinner. The attendant showed a crop-headed Prussian to the seat opposite him, and that led his thoughts back to his encounter with Herr Kronauer. The more he considered the matter, the more fantastic seemed the surmise that German espionage should have penetrated sufficiently far into British secrets to have grounds for taking an interest in his own activities. In fact, he did not believe it possible. It was, of course, on the cards that their agent, if Kronauer really was one, had mistaken him for someone else, or that Kronauer was not acting under orders from his government, and had been employed by a private firm to watch him for some reason, at which he could not even make a guess. Still, there was no getting away from it that he had been spied upon, and it was at least a possibility that someone had got on the train at Victoria with instructions to follow him to his destination.

  If that were so, whatever their object in keeping him under observation, the very fact that his movements were being recorded might later prove, not merely embarrassing, but dangerous. That would certainly be the case if at any time his work made it necessary for him to break the law, as anyone who had been spying on him while he did so would be in a position to give him away to the police, or, if it suited their book better, use their knowledge in an attempt to blackmail him.

  It seemed, therefore, a situation in which, by taking a little trouble now, he might save himself from the possibility of meeting with a great deal later on. Anyone who had boarded the train for the purpose of dogging him would certainly have learned by this time, from the labels on his luggage, that he was on his way to Belgrade. The Serbian capital was not a very big place and, once there, it would be almost impossible to move about its centre without proving an easy quarry for a tracker. But if he got off the train before it reached Belgrade, that would offer an excellent chance of escaping such unwelcome attention altogether.

  De Richleau chuckled to himself at the thought of how his theoretical opponent’s mind would almost certainly work in such circumstances. On arriving in Belgrade and finding that his man had left the train somewhere along the route, he would naturally assume that the labels on the baggage had been stuck on deliberately to fool him, and that from the first his quarry had never intended to go there. He might work back again along the line, but by then the trail would be cold; and as the express stopped at half a dozen places he would not even know at which to start his inquiries. The man he was after might have got out at Cologne, Mayence, Karlsruhe, Stuttgart, Munich, Salzburg, Linz, Vienna, Budapest or Szeged and, by the time he discovered how he had been out-witted, might have gone on to Berlin, Rome, Trieste or Prague. So, short of having the co-operation of half the police forces in Europe, to locate him again would be virtually impossible.

  Accordingly, the Duke swiftly began to formulate a
new plan of campaign. He knew that the train was due to reach Munich early in the morning, when the majority of its occupants would still be asleep, so to get off there offered the best chance of leaving it without being spotted. It would be pleasant to see Munich again, and after spending twenty-four hours there, he could catch the next day’s express on to Belgrade.

  But no! If he was being watched there was a chance that his shadow might not be put off the scent quite so easily. He might think that he had been noticed on the train, which had led to his quarry taking emergency measures to evade him. In that case he would probably remain in Belgrade for several days, in the belief that his man would turn up there before the week was out.

  Another idea then came to the Duke. Why should he not make his inquiries in Vienna before, instead of after, his visit to Belgrade. If he put in a week or ten days in the Austrian capital all the odds were that his shadow would have decided by then that he was wasting his time, and have left Serbia with the conviction that, after all, his quarry had never intended to go there.

  For a few minutes de Richleau did some serious heart-searching, as he wondered if he was not being influenced to adopt this new plan by his desire to see Ilona Theresa again but he decided that, even had he never met her, his mind would have worked on the same lines, as the plan was the logical outcome of the belief that he was quite possibly being followed.

  Having finished his dinner, he returned to his sleeping berth and asked the attendant there to call him half an hour before they were due to reach Munich, as he wished to hand a letter to someone who would be waiting on the platform to receive it. Then he turned in.