A Modern Mercenary Part 28

One of the men, coming forward, laid the sword upon the top of the barricade. Unziar grasped it and thrust it back into the scabbard.

'It was lost by treachery!' he flung out. 'And I leave it to these gentlemen to say where the shame lies!'

With that he leaped the barricade and pa.s.sed into the Duke's room.

CHAPTER XIX.

IN DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS.

It was late on the following morning before the Castle was awake. It almost seemed as if the guests had waited for the appearance of the rea.s.suring daylight before they ventured from their rooms. Four huge fires roared in the four great chimneys round the vast hall where the breakfast was in progress.

Sagan, in his weather-stained hunting suit and leggings, stood at the upper window overlooking the courtyard where the huntsmen and gaunt dogs, the famous Sagan boarhounds, were already collected, in antic.i.p.ation of the boar-hunt arranged to take place on that day. The sky had cleared, but the tsa raged and howled after its perennial custom about the Castle.

Madame de Sagan, entering later, cast a nervous glance at the grim red face and bull-neck, and then fell into a laughing conversation with the people round her, although her heart felt cold. She was far from being a brave woman, although she joined so gaily in the merry talk pa.s.sing from side to side; but her marvellous self-control was no more than the self-control common to women of her social standing. It is secondary strength, not innate but acquired, of which the finest instance is a matter of history, and was witnessed within the walls of the Conciergerie during the Reign of Terror, where men and women unflinchingly carried on a hollow semblance of the joyous comedy of life till they mounted laughing into the tumbrils.

Although nothing was known about the events of the previous night except by those who took part in them, a sense of excitement pervaded the party. The strained relations existing between the Duke and his possible successor gave rise to an amount of vague expectation and conjecture.

Anything might happen with such dangerous elements present in the atmosphere.

Therefore when Rallywood, booted and spurred, pa.s.sed up the hall, his entrance attracted every eye. He walked straight up to the Count at his distant window and saluting, spoke for perhaps a minute in a low voice.

At the first sentence Sagan swung round, his lowering face growing darker as he listened. Then, advancing to the head of the table prepared for the entertainment of the Duke, he called the attention of all present by striking it loudly with the riding-whip he carried.

An instant hush settled upon the room. Sagan glared round with waiting eyes, and in the pause the tsa broke in a crash upon the Castle front with the pebble-shifting sound of a breaker.

'I have to beg the favour of your attention for a moment,' the Count's words rang out. 'Captain Rallywood reports that an officer of his Highness's Guard is missing--Captain Colendorp. Inquiries have been made but he cannot be found. It seems that he was last seen leaving the billiard-room. If anyone in the hall can give us further information, will they be good enough to do so?'

Valerie raised her eyes to Rallywood, who stood behind the Count. As he met them the young man's stern face softened suddenly.

M. Blivinski, who happened to be sitting beside her, caught the exchange of looks, and for a moment was puzzled. Selpdorf's daughter? Well, well, the English are a wonderful people, he said to himself. Neither subtle nor gifted, but lucky. Lucky enough to give the devil odds and beat him!

Here was Selpdorf laying his plans deeply and with consummate skill, while this pretty clever daughter of his was ready to give him away because a heavy dragoon of the favoured race smiled at her across a breakfast table. Pah! The ways of Providence are inscrutable; it remains for mortal men to do what they may to turn them into more convenient channels.

Then there was Counsellor, whose political importance could not be denied. Yet he did the bluff thing bluffly and said the obvious thing obviously, and blundered on from one great city to another, but blundered triumphantly! Still there were compensations. The good G.o.d had given the Russian craft and a silent tongue, and a facility for telling a lie seasonably.

Elmur was by a fraction of a second too late to see what the Russian had seen. Valerie was very white, but she was talking indifferently to M.

Blivinski with her eyes fixed upon her plate. It was some time before she seemed to grow conscious of Elmur's gaze; a slight fleck of colour showed and paled in her cheeks, and then at length her long lashes fluttered up and the German perceived in the darkness of her eyes a trace of unshed tears.

'Mademoiselle, you are tired,' he said with solicitude.

'Yes,' she answered smiling. 'But we are going back to Revonde in a day or two, and then I will wipe out the remembrance of everything that has happened at Sagan from my mind forever!'

Elmur was about to reply when Sagan spoke again.

'No one appears to have heard or seen anything of Captain Colendorp. We will have the dogs out, Captain Rallywood. Pray tell his Highness that in the course of an hour or two we hope to be able to tell him where our man has got to. His absence is doubtless due to some trifling cause.'

As Rallywood retired Sagan cast a comprehensive glance around the tables, and noted Counsellor's absence with a sinister satisfaction.

All the morning he had been speculating upon the course Counsellor would pursue after the rencontre of the previous night. Most likely disappear from the Castle. He would not dare to brazen it out. Sagan argued that the British envoy could not be very sure of his position yet. What had he proposed to the Duke? And how had the Duke answered him? What was to be the result of the visit, or would there be any?

Selpdorf held the Duke's confidence. He must checkmate England and openly throw his influence into the German scale. No half courses could any longer avail in Maasau.

Here his reflections were interrupted, for Counsellor's big burly figure was bending over Madame de Sagan's chair, before he accepted the seat at her side with the a.s.sured manner of a favored guest.

Even the Russian attache blinked. Ah, these islanders! What next?

As an immediate result Count Sagan was forced to accept the situation thrust upon him.

'Have you slept well, Major?' he inquired sardonically. 'No bad dreams, eh?'

'I dream seldom--and I make it a point in the morning to forget bad dreams if I have had any,' replied Counsellor, with a good-humored raising of his big eyebrows.

'That is wise,' said Sagan, 'for dreams and schemes of the night rarely have solid foundations.'

'So they say, my lord, but I do not trouble myself about these things.

A man of my age is forced to consecrate his best energies to his digestion.'

The Duke had decided upon returning to Revonde during the forenoon, but most of the guests were to remain for the projected boar-hunt. The hunting-party had already started when Blivinski and Counsellor drove out of the Castle courtyard on their way to the nearest railway station, which lay under the mountains some miles away.

The _tsa_ had blown the snow into heavy drifts, leaving the roads and other exposed places bare and almost clean-swept. Near the station they pa.s.sed a squadron of the Guard sent by Wallenloup to escort the Duke back to the capital.

The pair in the carriage talked little, but when the jingling of accoutrements had died away Blivinski said in an emotionless tone:

'You met with Count Sagan last night then--in your dreams?'

'Yes, or Duke Gustave would have been over the border by this morning.'

'Ah!'

'And history goes to prove that reigning sovereigns are fragile ware--they cannot be borrowed without danger.'

'You allude to Bulgaria?' Blivinski asked promptly, with an air of genial interest.

'Why, for the sake of argument, Alexander can stand as a case in point.'

'If--I say if--we borrowed him, we also returned him.'

Counsellor's reply was characteristic, and justified his companion's opinion of his race.

'Damaged--so they say.'

Blivinski considered the dreary landscape.

'We must not believe all we hear. In diplomatic relations, my friend, ethics cease to exist. Diplomacy is after all a simple game--even elementary--a magnificent beggar-my-neighbour which we continue to play into eternity.'

'But there are rules ... even in beggar-my-neighbour,' said the Counsellor.

Blivinski kicked the rug softly from his feet as the carriage drew up.