The Shadow of the Czar Part 56

"If you have pledged your word for my withdrawal, I must go--and alone," he added.

"You shall not go to please them," she cried pa.s.sionately.

"Then I will go to please myself."

"Without me? Do you mean that--that we must part forever?"

The anguish of her voice went to Paul's heart. The stately princess that had confronted the Diet was gone, and in her place was a clinging, trembling maiden with eyes full of tears.

"Sweetest Barbara, doubt whatever else you will, but do not doubt my love. It behoves us to part at least for a time. I go, but you must remain. Remember, that, as a princess, you are not your own but your people's. If you desert Czernova you give to the duke the crown for which he is basely plotting. Do not let that traitor succeed. Do not hand over your loyal Poles to the tyranny of Bora. Abdication on your part will mean the final triumph of Russia."

"And that triumph is not far distant," replied Barbara bitterly. "We have received intelligence to-day from our amba.s.sadors at Berlin and Vienna that Prussia and Austria have jointly agreed to withdraw from the responsibility of upholding the integrity of Czernova, leaving the onus of this political duty to Russia. We know what this means. In plain language Kaiser and King will permit the Czar to exercise a free hand in the princ.i.p.ality. The long-threatened annexation is at hand."

"Then it is time for me to be going."

"In my hour of peril?"

"I go to save you from this peril, to deliver you from the ever-threatening shadow of the Czar. I have a scheme in mind,--a scheme so daring that it seems madness to attempt it; and yet better to dare and fail than not to dare at all. My plan, if it succeeds, will make Czernova so strong that it will no longer fear the arms of Russia. And then," added Paul hopefully, "and then it may be that in return for such service your ministry will regard me with more favorable eyes."

Love is proverbially blind, and therefore it will not seem matter for wonder that the princess in her pa.s.sionate attachment to Paul should place more reliance upon his promise than upon the united wisdom of her cabinet. But what his plan was she could not learn; to all her questions he smiled pleasantly and mysteriously; the sooner he set off the sooner would come its realization.

But each time he turned to depart Barbara pleaded so sweetly for delay that he was forced to stay a few minutes longer; and they continued to sit in the moonlight, Paul radiant with the hope of coming success, Barbara puzzled, yet confident in his ability to fulfil his word. They were a long time in parting, and often after saying what they intended as their final farewell they turned again to repeat it.

Paul at length tore himself away, and had not proceeded very far when he was met by Marshal Zabern.

"You are leaving Czernova?"

"Since the cabinet decrees it."

"But you must return."

"When?"

"On the eve of the princess's coronation."

"Why on that day?"

Zabern bent his head and whispered. The communication was such as to cause Paul's eyes to sparkle and his hand to seek the hilt of his sabre.

"Is that the plan of the duke, then?"

"Such is my belief. And you alone, Captain Woodville, can defeat it.

You will be there?"

"Can you doubt it? If I be living."

"Good! You will have the laugh of these fools," returned Zabern, referring to his colleagues in the ministry. "They will not deny you the hand of the princess then."

And Paul and Zabern parted on an understanding eminently satisfactory to both.

On the following day the ministry learned with relief that Captain Woodville had quitted Czernova, though none knew, not even Barbara, whither he had betaken himself.

The coronation ceremony was now but two months distant, and Zabern ventured to remind the princess that some of its most important details still awaited settlement.

"The great question is who shall have the high honor of crowning your Highness?"

"Abbot Faustus, for he is a good man," replied Barbara; and, noting Zabern's look of surprise, she added, "He, and none other. The cabinet have had their way in the matter of Captain Woodville; I will have my way in this. Let the council meet again to-day. When this point comes to be discussed, do you, marshal, propose Abbot Faustus for the office, and I will a.s.sent."

Though wondering much at her choice, Zabern refrained from comment.

That same evening another cabinet council was held in the Vistula Palace, Barbara again presiding.

Among the members present was the Archbishop Mosco, or, as he was styled in Slavowitz, the Archpastor, who, as previously stated, had a seat in the cabinet, not by the appointment of the princess, but by virtue of his office as head of the Greek Church in Czernova.

The crowning of the sovereign had hitherto been one of the privileges attaching to his see. Barbara's Latin faith, however, had necessarily deprived him of his prerogative, which would thus seem to devolve by natural right upon the highest ecclesiastic in the Catholic Church of Czernova, or in other words, upon the Cardinal Archbishop Ravenna.

Therefore, when Zabern rose to propose that Abbot Faustus, of the Convent of the Transfiguration, should have the high honor of crowning the princess, there were murmurs of dissent from the council, the majority not deeming the abbot of sufficient dignity for the office.

"The cardinal would regard such appointment as an affront to himself,"

remarked Radzivil.

"And might seek, in his disappointment, to give us trouble," commented Dorislas. "Being the ecclesiastical superior of Faustus, he might appear in the cathedral and interdict the abbot from crowning the princess, which would be a pretty scandal."

"Ah, well," replied Zabern, carelessly, "we have prisons for disorderly prelates, as well as for law-breaking dukes."

"What says her Highness in this matter?" said Radzivil turning to the princess.

"The marshal's nomination meets with my approval," returned Barbara.

"My lords, I will not now enter into my reasons. Let it suffice to say that Cardinal Ravenna has made it impossible for me to receive the crown from his hands. Sooner would I resign than do so."

Great wonderment appeared on the faces of the ministers, yet none ventured to ask in what way the cardinal had offended. Opposition to the abbot was immediately withdrawn, for the cabinet, gratified by Barbara's supposed dismissal of Paul, were in a complaisant mood, though they plainly saw trouble looming ahead in thus excluding Ravenna from partic.i.p.ating in the coronation.

At this point of the debate Polonaski intervened with a suggestion. He was the Justiciary, and by virtue of his office the highest legal authority in Czernova.

"Since your Highness reigns over Greeks as well as Catholics, would it not be politic to conciliate the former by permitting a Greek prelate to have some share, however small, in your coronation?"

"That is good counsel," replied Barbara. "I trust, my lord," she added, addressing Mosco with a gracious smile, "that you have not viewed with bitterness this setting aside of the ancient privilege attaching to your see? But, indeed, you are welcome to take whatever part you please in my coronation, short of the administration of the Sacrament and of the imposition of the diadem."

Mosco, apparently gratified by this concession, spent a few moments in studying the coronation ritual, a copy of which had been supplied to each member of the cabinet.

"I ask for nothing more," he finally observed, "than for leave to read the Gospel at the beginning of the ceremony."

"It is granted," replied Barbara, wondering why the archpastor should select this, a somewhat humble office, compared with others which were open to him.

Mosco's lips curved into a smile, which, though lasting but a moment, did not escape the quick eye of Zabern, who immediately became full of suspicion.

"As I live," he muttered to himself, "our archpastor is a traitor!

Have I got rid of Bora only to find that he has left a successor in the cabinet? That smile means mischief. But what mischief can come from the reading of the Gospel?"