The Shadow of the Czar Part 27

But scarcely had the heavy sabres clashed together, sparkling in the rays of the setting sun, when there came the command,--

"Let fall your swords in the name of the law."

The words were spoken in a woman's voice,--a voice that sent a thrill to Paul's heart.

Parrying a thrust from the duke, Paul took a swift backward step, and while maintaining his defensive att.i.tude, contrived to glance sideways.

And there, beautiful and pale, and so close to him that he could see into her eyes, was Barbara, breathless as if from hurrying. From what quarter she had so suddenly sprung none present could tell. Complete absorption in the duel had prevented them from hearing her light footfall upon the turf of the woodland.

Paul forgot his guard. He forgot everything. From sheer surprise his sword dropped to the ground.

He looked at her in silence, striving to learn what were her feelings towards him. She gave no token of recognition. Love on her part, if it existed, was veiled at present in sorrowful reproach. In the light of that look how ign.o.ble seemed his desire for vengeance. His glance fell even as his sword had fallen. He had acted, and knowingly acted, in a way calculated to forfeit her esteem.

A death-like stillness fell upon the circle as they perceived that the fair princess of Czernova, sternly hostile to duelling, was present, a spectator of their misdeed. True, she was but one maiden, but that maiden symbolized in her own person all the power of a state.

"Who first proposed this duel? Who issued the challenge?"

"I did, and with reason."

And stalking up to the princess, the Duke of Bora bent his head, and said in a fierce, jealous whisper,--

"Cousin Natalie, how comes yon fellow to be in possession of the seal I gave you?"

The princess stepped backward, and drawing her robe around her with a stately grace, she exclaimed,--

"It ill becomes one of my ministers to be found setting himself above the law. Marshal, conduct your prisoner to the Citadel."

Paul, following the wave of her arm, perceived that she had not come without an escort.

On the Czernovese side of the frontier-stone stood Marshal Zabern with folded arms, outwardly as inscrutable as the sphinx, inwardly delighted at the course taken by events.

Some distance in his rear, drawn up across the woodland path, the narrowness of which did not admit of more than two abreast, was a posse of mounted lancers belonging to the Blue Legion. Fronting these troopers was the vehicle evidently used by the princess in her journey to this spot,--a light, elegant droshky, expressly adapted for swift travelling.

And the Cossack sentinel, likewise noting all this, felt ill at ease.

The sound of his bugle would instantly have summoned a party from the Russian guard-house, but as this might have led to the exposure of his own partic.i.p.ation in the affair, he refrained from the act, and looked on in silence.

"Marshal, conduct your prisoner to the Citadel."

"You would arrest _me_?"

There was an emphasis on the last word which was intended to remind the princess that it behoved her to consider who he was. It was clear to her that relying on his kinship to the Czar, he set little store by the law of Czernova. His pitying smile cut the const.i.tutionalist princess to the quick.

"You talk bravely, fair cousin, forgetful in whose territory you now stand. I put myself under the protection of this sentry, the representative of the Czar."

The duke was not mending matters in appealing to the Czar for protection against the law of Czernova.

"O silly duke!" murmured Zabern. "How nicely you are playing into my hands! You have lost the princess by that speech."

The Cossack sentinel, now heartily regretting that he had become compromised by an affair in which the great ones of Czernova were involved, nevertheless at the duke's abjuration rode off to the princess.

"What is this?" he cried, with an air of authority. "Prisoner? No arrest can take place here. Little mother, you are standing on Russian ground; therefore--your pa.s.sport, signed by the Russian consul at Slavowitz."

"Princesses do not carry pa.s.sports," replied Barbara disdainfully.

"Then the little mother must retire to her own side of the frontier."

Barbara seemed disposed at first to maintain her ground, but wiser thoughts prevailed.

"You do but your duty," she replied.

And with this she retired, and took her station by the side of Zabern.

"Princess, I commend your celerity," smiled the marshal. "I was five years in getting out of Russia,--you have accomplished it in as many seconds."

Then lowering his voice to a whisper, he continued,--

"We cannot arrest the duke while he is on Russian ground. Were we to do so, this Cossack would report the matter. In their present mood Russian ministers would gladly seize upon the violation of their territory as a _casus belli_, and we don't want war at present."

"John Lilieski," said the princess, addressing the duke from her own side of the frontier, "you will either return under guard to Slavowitz, or you will not return at all. Take your choice betwixt imprisonment during my pleasure, or perpetual banishment from Czernova."

This decision from one whom he had been accustomed to regard as his affianced bride completely confounded his grace of Bora. His first surprise over, he proceeded to take counsel with his second. Though they spoke in low tones, Paul nevertheless caught a few words.

"They dare not harm you," said Ostrova, "and you will command more interest, more sympathy, more power as a prisoner in the Citadel than as a hanger-on at the Czar's court."

This argument seemed to decide the duke, for he immediately crossed to the Czernovese side.

"Since you make a voluntary surrender of yourself," said the princess, "declare it aloud that the Russian sentry may hear you."

"Of my own free will I enter the Czernovese territory," said Bora, addressing the Cossack.

"Your sword," said Zabern.

Though not as yet deposed from his command of the army, Bora did not doubt that this would follow, and that Zabern would be his successor.

Very bitter, indeed, then, was his smile as he handed the sabre over to the marshal.

"I am curious to learn, fair cousin," he sneered, "the punishment you reserve for my opponent, equally guilty with myself of breaking the law."

"There is your escort to Slavowitz," said Barbara haughtily, pointing to the posse of uhlans.

And Bora, with a dark glance at Paul, walked in the direction indicated.

"For my part," observed Baron Ostrova airily, "I prefer liberty. I shake the dust of Czernova from my feet."

"Forever," decreed the princess.

"Oh, your Highness, your reign will not last so long as that," replied the other, with a peculiar smile, adding to himself, "Your reign, my lady, is but a question of a few weeks."

Taking off his hat, he dropped it to the ground, and bowed so low over it as almost to touch the turf with his fingers, herein imitating an old custom of the Polish serf when addressing his lord.