The King's Mirror Part 13

"Yes, soon; it will seem very soon to you."

"What's the moral?" said I.

She laughed uneasily, twisting the screen in her hands. For an instant she raised her eyes to mine, and as they dropped again she whispered:

"A short life and a merry one?"

My hand flew out to her again; she took it, and, after a laughing glance, curtseyed low over it, as though in formal farewell. I had not meant that, and laughed in my turn.

"I shan't be old--well, by to-morrow," she murmured, and glanced ostentatiously at the clock.

"May I come to-morrow?"

"I never invite you."

"Shall you be here?"

"It's not one of my receiving days."

"I like a good chance better than a poor certainty. At least there will be n.o.body else here."

"Max, perhaps."

"I don't think so."

"You don't think so? What do you mean by that, Caesar? No, I don't want to know. I believe it was impertinent. Are you going?"

"Yes," said I, "when I have kissed your hand."

She said nothing, but held it out to me. She smiled, but there seemed to me to be pain in her eyes. I pressed her hand to my lips and went out without speaking again. As I closed the door I heard her fling herself back into her chair with a curious little sound, half-cry, half-sigh.

I left the house quickly and silently; no servant was summoned to escort me. I walked a few yards along the street to where Wetter lived. My carriage was ordered to come for me at Wetter's; it had not yet arrived.

To be known to visit Wetter was to accept the blame of a smaller indiscretion as the price of hiding a greater. The deputy was at home, writing in his study; he received me with an admirable unconsciousness of where I had come from. I was still in a state of excitement, and was glad to sit smoking quietly while his animated, fluent talk ran on. He was full of this Bill of his, and explained its provisions to me with the air of desiring that I should understand its spirit and aim, and of being willing then to leave it to my candid consideration. He did not attempt to blink the difficulties.

"Of course we have the Prince and all the party of Reaction against us,"

he said. "But your Majesty is not a member of any party."

"Not even of yours yet," said I with a laugh.

He laughed in his turn, openly and merrily.

"I'm a poor schemer," he said. "But I don't know why it should be wrong for you to hear my views any more than Hammerfeldt's."

The servant entered and announced the arrival of my carriage. Wetter escorted me to it.

"I'll promise not to mention the Bill, if you'll honour me by coming again, sire," he said as he held the brougham door.

"I shall be delighted to come again; I like to hear about it," I answered. His bow and smile conveyed absolutely nothing but a respectful gratification and a friendly pleasure. Yet he knew that the situation of his house was more responsible for my visit than the interest of his projects.

In part I saw clear enough even at this time. It was the design and hope of Wetter and his friends to break down Hammerfeldt's power and obtain a political influence over me. Hammerfeldt's political dominance seemed to them to be based on a personal ascendency; this they must contrive to match. Their instrument was not far to seek. The Countess was ready to their hand, a beautiful woman, sharpest weapon of all in such a strife.

They put her forward against the Prince in the fight whereof I was the prize. All this I saw, against it all I was forewarned, and forearmed.

Knowledge gave security. But there was more, and here with the failure of insight safety was compromised. What was her mind? What was her part, not as it seemed to these busy politicians, but as her own heart taught it her? Here came to me the excitement of uncertainty, the impulse of youth, the p.r.i.c.k of vanity, the longing for that intimate love of which my life had given me so little. Was I to her also only something to be used in the game of politics, a tool that she, a defter tool, must shape and point before it could be of use? I tried to say this to myself and to make a barrier of the knowledge. But was it all the truth?

Remembering her eyes and tones, her words and hesitations, I could not accept it for the whole truth. There was more, what more I knew not.

Even if there had been no more I was falling so deep into the gulf of pa.s.sion that it crossed my mind to take while I gave; and, if I were to be used, to exact my hire. In a tumult of these thoughts, embracing now what in the next moment I rejected, revolting in a sudden fear from the plan which just before seemed so attractive, I pa.s.sed the evening and the night. For I had taken up that mixed heritage of good and evil, of pain and power, that goes by the name of manhood; and when a new heir enters on his inheritance there is a time before he can order it.

CHAPTER X.

OF A POLITICAL APPOINTMENT.

A few days later my mother informed me that Victoria and her husband had proposed to pay us a long visit. I could make no objection. Princess Heinrich observed that I should be glad to see Victoria again, and should enjoy the companionship of William Adolphus. In my mind I translated her speech into a declaration that Victoria might have some influence over me although my mother had none, and that William Adolphus would be more wholesome company than my countesses and Wetters and such riff-raff. I was unable to regard William Adolphus as an intellectual resource, and did not a.s.sociate Victoria with the exercise of influence.

The weakness of the Princess's new move revealed the straits to which she felt herself reduced. The result of the position which I have described was almost open strife between her and me; Hammerfeldt's powerful bridle alone held her back from declared rupture. His method of facing the danger was very different. He sought to exercise no veto, but he kept watch; he knew where I went, but made no objection to my going; any liberal notions which I betrayed in conversation with him he received with courteous attention, and affected to consider the result of my own meditations. Had my feelings been less deeply involved I think his method would have succeeded; even as it was he checked and r.e.t.a.r.ded what he could not stop. The cordiality of our personal relations remained unbroken and so warm that he felt himself able to speak to me in a half-serious, half-jesting way about the Countess von Sempach.

"A most charming woman indeed," said he. "In fact, too charming a woman."

I understood him, and began to defend myself.

"I'm not in love with the Countess," I said; "but I give her my confidence, Prince."

He shook his head, smiled, and took a pinch of snuff, glancing at me humorously.

"Reverse it," he suggested. "Be in love with her, but don't give her your confidence. You'll find it safer and also more pleasant that way."

My confidence might affect high matters, my love he regarded as a pa.s.sing fever. He did not belong to an age of strict morality in private life, and his bent of mind was utterly opposed to considering an intrigue with a woman of the Countess's attractions as a serious crime in a young man of my position. "Hate her," was my mother's impossible exhortation. "Love her, but don't trust her," was the Prince's subtle counsel. He pa.s.sed at once from the subject, content with the seed that he had sown. There was much in him and in his teaching which one would defend to-day at some cost of reputation; but I never left him without a heightened and enhanced sense of my position and my obligations. If you will, he lowered the man to exalt the king; this was of a piece with all his wily compromises.

Victoria arrived, and her husband. William Adolphus's att.i.tude was less apologetic than it had been before marriage; he had made Victoria mother to a fine baby, and claimed the just credit. He was jovial, familiar, and, if I may so express myself, brotherly to the last degree.

Happily, however, he interpreted his more a.s.sured position as enabling him to choose his own friends and his own pursuits; these were not mine, and in consequence I was little troubled with his company. As an ally to my mother he was a pa.s.sive failure; his wife was worse than inactive.

Victoria's conduct displayed the height of unwisdom. She denounced the Countess to my face, and besought my mother to omit the Sempachs from her list of acquaintances. Fortunately the Princess had been dissuaded from forcing on an open scandal; my sister had to be content with matching her mother's coldness by her rudeness when the Countess came to Court. Need I say that my attentions grew the more marked, and gossip even more rife?

Wetter's Bill came up for discussion, and was hurled in vain against Hammerfeldt's solid phalanx of country gentlemen and wealthy _bourgeoisie_. I had kept a seal on my lips, and in common opinion was still the Prince's docile disciple. Wetter accepted my att.i.tude with easy friendliness, but he ventured to observe that if any case arose which enabled me to show that my hostility to his party was not inveterate, the proof would be a pleasure to him and his friends, and possibly of no disadvantage to me. Not the barest reference to the Countess pointed his remark. I had not seen her or heard from her for nearly a week; on the afternoon of the day after the Bill was thrown out I decided to pay her a visit. Wetter was to take luncheon at her house, and I allowed him to drop a hint of my coming. I felt that I had done my duty as regards the Bill; I was very apprehensive of my reception by the Countess. The opposition that encircled me inflamed my pa.s.sion for her; the few days' separation had served to convince me that I could not live without her.

I found her alone; her face was a little flushed and her eyes bright.

The moment the door was shut she turned on me almost fiercely.

"Why did you send to say you were coming?"

"I didn't send; I told Wetter. Besides, I always send before I go anywhere."

"Not always before you come to me," she retorted. "You're not to hide behind your throne, Caesar. I was going out if you hadn't prevented me."

"The hindrance need not last a moment," said I, bowing.

She looked at me for an instant, then broke into a reluctant smile.

"You haven't sent to say you were coming for a week," she said.