A CROWN OF STRAW

A
CROWN OF STRAW

BY
ALLEN UPWARD
AUTHOR OF
“THE QUEEN AGAINST OWEN,” “THE PRINCE OF
BALKISTAN,” ETC.

NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1896

Copyright, 1896,
By Dodd, Mead and Company.
University Press:
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U. S. A.

PREFACE

The term novel has been made to cover books of such diverse character, now-a-days, that the reader is almost entitled to demand of a novelist that he shall affix some distinct label to the book he is putting forth, and make it clear beforehand whether his work is a dialogue on religion, a satire on morals, a political tract, a study in slum life, or a mere romance. This consideration must serve as my excuse for saying a few words about the ideas which have guided me in writing the present work; although I shall incur the danger of a comparison between the moon at which I have aimed, and the humble tree which I have hit.

In this story, then, as in some others which I have written, or am writing, I have sought to embody the romance of contemporary history. It cannot be true that one age or country is in reality more poetical than any other; the difference, if any, must be that it requires a little more imagination to perceive the romance which lies around us, than that which is ready gathered for us in the pages of the historian. If it be said that some of the greatest masters have gone to past times for their inspiration, their disciple may perhaps allege that as a reason for not venturing into the well-trodden ground. But in fact many of the books which have been most admired in the class of what are called historical novels have owed a part of their charm to the flavour of antiquity which their accomplished writers have contrived to impart to them by mannerisms of style and by the copious use of historical allusion. However great the attraction of such writing may be, it must not be forgotten that the greatest, perhaps the first, of historical romancers—I mean Shakespeare—relied upon no such artifices, but on the intrinsic interest of his themes and his dramatic presentation of them. Neither is it the antiquarian taste which is appealed to by such a book as the “Three Musketeers.” It may even be affirmed, on the other hand, that the interest with which stories are thus invested is essentially false, and foreign to the story-teller’s art.

The keen pleasure with which the historical scholar reads the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” is the accidental result of time, and certainly never entered into the aims of the composer or compiler of those works. The novels of Emile Zola may similarly fascinate the student in years to come, because he will feel that the manners they record are genuine. But with what confidence can he regard the Wardour Street properties which bulk so largely in the novels of some modern writers? Unless these books tell stories whose interest is independent of adventitious attraction, assuredly they will not continue to be read.

The true aim of the artist in fiction must always be to describe an interesting action,—the Greeks would have said, a great action. The characters which still live for us in fiction are those which their creators have revealed to us through their actions. The analytical novel of character, as it is termed, bears the same relation to true romance as the surgeon’s anatomical model bears to a portrait of Velasquez. It is the business of the story-teller to produce, not a photograph of one who sits in a chair, but a kinetoscope, with every limb in motion. The analytical novelist, when he has written his analytical novel, should regard it as merely a preparatory study, and should tear it up and then write a real novel in which the characters so carefully analysed will by their movements disclose all those traits of which their creator has laboured to convince himself.

This is why the play is greater than the novel. The playwright—robbed of his Chorus—cannot inflict upon us these tedious dissertations, he cannot leave his persons standing about idly on the stage, while he lectures to us on their inner nature as revealed to his Röntgen vision. The story told in these pages was conceived by the author as the subject of a play. The only reason it appears in the guise of a novel is because, when it was written, the author had no acquaintance with theatrical managers, and a play written merely to be read in a book has always appeared to him a monstrosity. He therefore reconstructed his romance, making such alterations as seemed needful when the characters were no longer visible of themselves, and when, moreover, he was debarred from that crowding of circumstance, that rush and climax of events, which the stage demands and justifies, but which on the written page would seem abrupt and harsh.

Most readers will trace in the hero of this book a resemblance to a certain king whose fate attracted attention not so very many years ago. I would ask that the comparison shall be carried no farther. This book is in no sense taken from history. All that I have intended to do has been to conceive a romantic interpretation for a tragical event, and to set forth that interpretation as a story to be read for its own sake, if at all.

A. U.

CONTENTS

A CROWN OF STRAW

PROLOGUE

I
THE LOADING OF THE PISTOL

In the inner room of a small, dimly lighted house, half hidden behind the dark walls of the arsenal of Stuttgart, in Germany, a group of three men were occupied in loading a pistol.

Their method of proceeding was singular. They were seated around a small deal table which stood at the far end of the room from the door. On the table was a small open lamp, and the dirty yellow flame which struggled upwards from its untrimmed wick flared upon the faces of the three, and brought them into pallid relief against the surrounding shadow. As the sickly light wandered off into the corners of the bare, gloomy room, it revealed the obscure form of a fourth man, younger than any of the first three, who sat by himself on a bench next to the door.

The group engaged in loading the pistol, absorbed in their task, took no notice of their comrade, who watched them with brooding eyes as they bent their heads together across the table, or spoke to each other in low whispers from time to time. Once or twice he turned his head and gazed abstractedly at the door. It was locked; and the high, narrow window at the opposite end of the chamber was closely shuttered and barred.

The leader of the party, a man whose grey hairs and deeply wrinkled face showed him to be by many years the eldest of the four, had commenced the proceedings by opening a small wooden case which lay on the table between the three, and taking out the pistol, which he first carefully examined, and then handed silently to the man seated next to him.

This man, a burly giant, with tremendous red whiskers and beard, in which his face was almost concealed, caught at the pistol with a grunt of satisfaction. In his huge grasp the weapon looked like a toy, as he held it up to the light, glanced down the barrel, and snapped the trigger. At this sound the youth by the door started ever so slightly, and a frown contracted his brows. Then the red-bearded giant passed on the pistol to the last of the three.

“Here, Johann,” he remarked in low tones, “see if you can find anything wrong with it.”

The man addressed as Johann, who appeared much younger than either of his companions, received the pistol in silence, as silently turned it over, and passed it back to the old man.

The pistol was of old-fashioned make, and had but a single barrel. Evidently it was only meant to fire one shot.

While the others were handling it, the leader had gone on with his preparations. From the small wooden case already mentioned he had taken out a small powder-flask, a wad, a short steel ramrod, and a bullet. To these he added an ordinary percussion-cap, and last of all came a bar of black sealing-wax, and a curious narrow stick tipped with a steel button. On this button a cipher of some kind appeared to be engraved.

Having ranged these articles on the table before himself and his comrades, the old man received back the pistol, and proceeded to load it at the muzzle from the powder-flask. Slowly the stream of black salt trickled out, sprinkling its course with tiny sparks of light, as the sharp-edged particles caught and flashed back the glow from the sputtering lamp. Then the weapon again changed hands, and the man with the red beard fitted in the wad, and vigorously rammed it home.

This done, he handed the pistol again to Johann, with the whispered exclamation, “Now for the sugar-plum!”

His younger comrade took it from him as quietly as before, dropped in the bullet, and returned the weapon once more to the senior of the three.

All this time the young man by the door had neither moved nor spoken. A faint shiver which passed through his frame when the bullet tinkled against the edge of the barrel alone told that he was keenly alive to what was going forward.

Now came the remarkable part of the ceremony. As soon as the old man got possession of the pistol for the third time, he rose solemnly to his feet, and taking up the bar of sealing-wax, ignited it over the naked flame of the lamp. As the wax hissed and flared up, he brought it directly over the upright muzzle of the pistol, allowing the burning drops to fall right down the barrel. The next moment he dropped the bar of sealing-wax, and seizing the narrow rod already described, plunged it down the barrel, and sealed the bullet firmly in its place.

The giant, who had watched this operation with the closest attention, now took the pistol once more, and completed the work of preparation by fitting on the percussion-cap, over which he allowed the hammer to close down.

All being ready, Johann received the loaded weapon in his hands, while the fourth member of the party rose from his seat beside the door, and advanced at a given signal towards the others.

“Don’t be afraid, Karl,” said the big man good-naturedly, as he caught sight of his young comrade’s face. “The pistol has not been loaded for you.”

The two others frowned at this remark, and the elder man held up his hand in rebuke.

“Hush! Our brother is right to feel afraid—afraid lest the sealed bullet should fail to reach its mark.” And he thoughtfully scanned the young man’s features, now looking almost livid in the wan glow of the lamp.

Meanwhile the other young man had risen to his feet. Holding the mysterious weapon in his hand, he put the following question to his comrade:—

“Brother, the lot has chosen you to fire this pistol. Are you ready to take it, and carry out the instructions you will receive?”

“I am,” came in husky tones from the youth.

He put out a shaking hand, and received the pistol from Johann.

Then the elder man pulled out a drawer in the table, took out a piece of paper, wrote on it a single word of seven letters, and handed it to the man with the red beard.

He glanced at it amid a dead silence, nodded his head, and passed it on to Johann, who by this time had sat down again. He read the word with a grim smile, and returned the paper to the leader of the party.

The old man solemnly folded up the paper, sealed it with the cipher already used for the bullet, and placed it in the hands of the giant.

It was now his turn to rise and address the agitated Karl.

“Here are your instructions. Do you undertake to return here, if you are alive and free, at the end of three months, and give an account of your mission?”

“I do.”

This time it was little more than a hoarse whisper which came from the young man.

The others appeared satisfied.

The old man arose, and moving out from behind the table, went up to the youth and gave him a solemn embrace.

The good-natured giant followed, and took advantage of the opportunity to whisper in his comrade’s ear—

“Keep up a good heart, my boy; and if you want help, rely on us.”

Then Johann made a step forward, but stopped short.

He was interrupted by an unexpected sound.

The noise of hurrying feet was heard in the passage outside, and was instantly followed by a succession of low distinct taps on the bottom panel of the door.

The four men simultaneously raised their heads and exchanged glances of inquiry and alarm. Only on the face of one of them, he who held the sealed weapon beneath his dress, was the look of dread chequered by a faint expression of relief.

The next moment Johann moved towards the door.

II
THE SEALED INSTRUCTIONS

The word written inside the sealed paper was a name.

The name was Leopold.

Who was this Leopold—and for what cause had his name come to figure so ominously in these surroundings? To-day he is forgotten; the whole of Europe rang then with the name of Leopold IX., the wicked King of Franconia.

A few words as to this personage will serve to throw light on the more recent events with which this story is concerned.

The race from which he sprang has long held an evil renown upon the Continent. For more than a century a dark cloud has overshadowed the royal line of Astolf. A mysterious taint in the blood has broken out time after time in the Franconian princes, betraying itself in wild freaks and excesses, which are rather whispered of than named. A monotonous chronicle of madness and crime makes up the gloomy annals of the House.

Something of this doubtless has been due to the peculiar character of their sovereignty. While smaller kingdoms, with narrower resources, have played an independent part on the European stage, Franconia, hampered by its position in the great Germanic body, has remained a petty State, compelled to be a mere satellite in the train of one of the two great monarchies which have contended for the dominion of Germany. In former ages her kings had received ambassadors, and their alliance had been alternately courted by Austria and France. To-day, closely enswathed in the iron bonds of Prussia’s military empire, the Franconian kingdom has ceased to have an international existence. In the eyes of diplomacy she is no better than a province of the Kaiser’s dominions, and in the council of nations her voice is no longer heard.

Yet within their own borders the kings of Franconia continue to be supreme. Deprived of their authority in the great questions of peace and war, in all matters of local interest they rule their kingdom with an independent sway. It would even seem as though the peculiar relations between them and the Imperial Government had added to the security of their throne. It would require no ordinary degree of misgovernment to provoke a rebellion whose success must mean the extinction of Franconian nationality, and its final subjection to the formidable Prussian yoke.

Their situation resembles that of those satraps who reign with absolute power over the provinces of Oriental empires. The difference is that they are irremovable, and hand on their dominion to their heirs.

To the intoxication of despotism add the intoxication of security. The strongest brain will reel under such pressure. History recalls the line of maniacs who slew and wantoned in Imperial Rome.

In modern Europe a bloodthirsty despot has become an impossibility. A king no longer dares to kill his subjects for the pleasure of it. All that has been put an end to by a glorious invention of the physicians. They have invented the word monomania, a tremendous exorcism, the mere utterance of which reduces the most powerful monarch to impotence, scares away his courtiers, paralyses the arms of his guards, and tears him from his throne to bury him behind iron doors.

It was with this spell that their bewildered subjects had fought the kings of Franconia for the last two generations. There was only one man in the kingdom more powerful than the monarch. This was the Court physician.

He glided in and out among the brightly dressed throng of courtiers, wrapped in his black cloak, with his finger on his lips, and watched everything. It was like the mummy at the Egyptian feast, only more terrible, as if it had been a mummy which might at any instant start to life, and bid the giver of the feast take its place in the sarcophagus.

When the time came, the physician unclosed his lips and pronounced the fatal word. Then the king disappeared silently from view, and a new ruler took his place.

This was the new Vehmgericht.

Like the ancient Venetian doges, the kings of Franconia walked everywhere, surrounded by an atmosphere of mysterious dread. Secret eyes were upon them always. Oubliettes were prepared under their feet, into which they never knew the moment when they might not be cast. And from these oubliettes there was no chance of escape.

The dooms of science are more relentless than the dooms of superstition. In the bosom of a Grand Inquisitor there might lurk mercy as much as a grain of mustard seed. Mercy is a word which science is unable to comprehend. Its judgments are merely conclusions. Mathematical reasoning cannot be bent aside by emotional considerations.

Leopold IX. was the worst king of this line. This was because he was the most sane. He was selfish, ignorant, utterly heartless, grasping, cruel, lustful, a glutton, and a bad son and father. But he was neither a drunkard nor an epileptic. To such a man science had nothing to say. The secret inquisitor was powerless. Leopold IX. had broken the curse. He was too much like the average man to be mad.

His younger brother Otto had been an easier victim. Within a year of his marriage with the beautiful Hermengarde of Schwerin-Strelitz, he had disappeared. Men whispered that the stately, cold-looking bride had given her approval to this consummation. Be that as it may, Otto passed the years till his death plaiting straw, like many another of the Astolf princes. Some of them plaited crowns; these were light and easy to wear.

Leopold reigned on. His people had to suffer a great deal. A few of his exploits are on record.

A jeweller in the capital had made his fortune. He was getting old, and meant to retire. The last transaction he undertook was a heavy purchase of diamonds. The stones were lying in his safe, when one night a troop of masked burglars broke in and carried off everything. The police of the capital were under the royal control, and on this particular night they had left that quarter of the city deserted. The robbers got off in perfect safety, and the old jeweller was ruined. Shortly afterwards he left the city. It was rumoured that he had retired to Stuttgart, the capital of a neighbouring kingdom.

A sergeant in the royal bodyguard had been imprisoned for a few months, and then banished, shortly before this event. This punishment had been awarded for certain angry expressions which he had been heard to use about his royal master. The fellow had been let off lightly, as his mind was supposed to be affected by a family trouble. His daughter, a very beautiful young girl, had taken her own life and that of her unborn infant. The name of its father had not transpired. This sergeant was a man remarkable for his size and for the redness of his beard.

Riding out in the royal park one day, Leopold met a forester’s boy, a lad of seventeen. He gave him a cut across the face with his whip, which drew blood. This boy, too, had not been seen for some time. His name was Karl Fink.

Leopold had a wise dread of education. The schools which he found existing in his kingdom he would have put down if he dared. His anger was roused when he learned that some of the young artisans in his capital had started night classes in which they studied draughtsmanship, mathematics, and engineering. He ordered his police to break up these schools, and prosecute the ringleaders of the movement. They were afterwards discharged, but those of them who were still bent on acquiring knowledge had to turn their steps abroad. The chief of these young men was one Johann Mark, a journeyman printer.

Of late Leopold had begun to show himself more cruel. His own son Maximilian, it was said, had to endure a good deal at his father’s hands.

Maximilian was a shy, delicate youth, with a passion for art and music. He resembled his mother, a gentle princess of Spanish birth, who was commonly believed to have died of a broken heart. Some there were who spoke of direct acts of violence, but history cannot dwell on the gossip of chamberwomen. Leopold had sought a fresh alliance abroad without success, and was now living in morganatic relations with an ugly countess of fifty.

She was the only person in his dominions who was not afraid of him.

It was known that she exerted her influence with his father on behalf of Maximilian, and saved him from much ill-usage. Very likely she did this with an eye to her future interest. Maximilian thought it was sheer good nature, and liked the woman.

Leopold hated her.

For the rest he was a short, squat man, with a red face, and prominent eyes like marbles, of some colour between blue and green; and he had a habit, when excited, of pressing his forefinger lengthways against his upper lip.

He was forty-eight years of age, and had reigned since he was twenty-nine.

III
THE FIRING OF THE PISTOL

Johann stepped cautiously towards the door.

Arrived before the keyhole, he put his eye to it. All was dark outside.

“Who are you?” he whispered after a moment’s pause.

The answer came also in a whisper. It seemed to satisfy him. Nodding to his comrades inside to signify that all was right, he quietly unlocked the door.

The man who entered was not a particularly striking figure in himself, but there was that in his appearance which instantly aroused the interest of the four inmates of the room, and caused them to gather eagerly around him.

His clothes were disordered, his face was flushed and bedewed with perspiration, and his short, quick breaths bore witness to the exertion he had made in getting there. But it was not this which arrested the attention of the others. They perceived a nervous excitement in his bearing, and an eager light in his eye, which warned them that he was the bearer of extraordinary tidings.

His first act on entering was to look round and number with a glance the men who stood inside. This done, a sigh of relief escaped him.

“Thank Heaven, I am in time!” he exclaimed.

“Why, what is it?” demanded the old man.

The new-comer dropped on to the bench beside the door before answering. Then, assuming a more solemn expression, he said in impressive tones—

“Your work has been done. This morning King Leopold went mad and cut his throat. He died at noon.”

As soon as he had finished speaking the young man who had been entrusted with the sealed weapon gave a loud cry, and tottered as though he would fall.

The giant rushed to his assistance, and, taking the pistol from his nerveless clasp, handed it to the leader.

He took it, and pointed it downwards.

“You have spoken truth,” he said gravely. “God has done our work.”

And he fired the pistol.

He was about to throw away the smoking weapon when Johann stepped forward and laid his hand upon it.

“Stay. It may be wanted yet,” he observed quietly.

“For whom?” the old man asked, with astonishment.

“For Maximilian.”

The other four men recoiled.

Half an hour after the house was empty. The comrades had dispersed. It was to be after many years, and under widely different circumstances, that some of them were to meet again.

Meanwhile Maximilian ascended the throne and reigned in peace.

CHAPTER I
THE GARDEN OF EDEN

“Can you see him, father?”

The old forester looked round, and saw his daughter coming down the narrow path, bordered with dwarf apple trees, which led from the front door of the cottage to the garden gate.

Answering by a slight shake of the head, he turned round again, and leant over the gate, resuming his occupation of drawing long slow puffs at a huge pipe which he held in one hand. The pipe had a long cherry-wood stem, ending in a deep china bowl, which was capped with a lid of copper. From the holes in this lid came thin blue spirals of smoke, which floated away till they were lost to view against the green background of forest.

Dorothea ran forward lightly, her white muslin skirts just touching the espaliers as she passed, and, coming up to the gate, leant over it beside her father. She rested her soft cheek against his arm, and gazed with dreamy eyes at the smoke-rings, trying to follow them till they dissolved in the surrounding atmosphere.

The summer heat lay like a film over the afternoon. The hush of the landscape was not even disturbed by the call of a bird or the dry chirp of a cricket. In front of the gateway at which they stood stretched a clear space of rolling turf for one or two hundred paces, at the end of which the grass began to go out of sight beneath short undergrowth and scattered trees, the fringe of a stately woodland. To the right and left of the forester’s lodge the trees gathered in again. Behind, it was approached by a footpath over a widening tract of fields, a tongue of meadow-land thrust into the forest. Far away over the fields, had they looked, rose the faint tower of a church and the signs of a peopled land.

“It is more than two months since he first began coming here,” murmured the young girl, presently. “I wonder who he can be?”

The forester turned his head and smiled, as though there were something in his daughter’s words which caused him secret amusement. Then he took another deep puff at his pipe, and answered—

“It is best not to ask. If he wished us to know he would tell us himself. Take care to please him, without being too curious.”

“I know he comes from the Castle, so he must be one of the gentlemen of the Court,” said Dorothea, speaking slowly, as if to herself. “Who knows? perhaps he is a count.”

As she uttered the word Castle, she raised her eyes, and turned them on an opening in the forest in front, between which and the cottage gate there ran a beaten path. For, a mile and more away through that forest, there rose the royal Castle of Neustadt; and old Franz Gitten was a forester in the service of King Maximilian.

This time Franz spoke more roughly, as if ill pleased with Dorothea’s words.

“It is no business of ours who he is. As long as he likes to come here and drink our cider he is welcome. I tell you not to trouble your head about it.”

Checked in this direction, the girl let a few minutes pass before speaking again.

“I wonder why he comes here so often,” was her next remark. “Surely the wines at the Castle must be better than our cider.”

Again the forester smiled to himself, as he went on smoking without any response.

Dorothea continued—

“The King is at Neustadt now. Will you take me over, some time, father? I have never seen the King.”

Old Franz interrupted her. He raised himself up, with a grunt of satisfaction, and stood looking at the opening in the wood.

Dorothea followed the direction of his glance, and uttered an exclamation.

Two men had just emerged from the shadow of the forest, and were walking through the sheet of sunlight which lay between it and the forester’s lodge.

The ages of these two men differed by a good many years. The elder of the two was a man of over forty, tall, with auburn hair, and restless eyes which glanced perpetually from side to side as he walked along. His dress was easy—a knickerbocker suit of brown velveteen, with a loose open collar, and crimson tie, and a hat of soft black felt with a wide brim. This brim he pulled down over his face as soon as the sunlight struck upon it, and thus partly screened his features from the curious gaze of Dorothea.

“Whom is he bringing with him?” she whispered to her father. “This is the first time he has not come alone.”

The forester took no notice of the question. His attention, after the first brief look, was engaged by the other of the two companions.

In itself the younger man’s figure was not striking. He was short, and yet too slender for symmetry. It was his face which aroused interest, and, with the long straight nose and pointed chin, conveyed the curious suggestion of a younger and handsomer Don Quixote. The delicate contour of the features was like a woman’s, and there was something at once strange and fascinating in the colour of the eyes, which glowed in the bright sunshine with that pale green flame only seen in the field of a rich sunset or in the hollow of certain shells of the Indian seas. But an almost uncanny note was that struck by the young man’s costume. He wore a close-fitting suit of a shade of green exactly matching the grass across which he was walking, so that it was nearly as difficult for the eye to follow the outline of his figure as it is to pick out a green caterpillar against a leaf. This affectation was carried out even to the green acacia stick which swung between his fingers. Only his hat and boots were black, the former similar to his companion’s, but enriched by the addition of a tiny band of gold lacework round the edge. He walked with a light, swift step, and as he came within view of the figures at the lodge gate his face relaxed into a pleased smile.

As the two drew near the entrance, Franz took his pipe from his mouth, and held the gate open for them to pass. At the same time he removed his hat and greeted the younger one, who entered first, with a deep bow.

“Good day, Herr Maurice,” he said, in respectful tones.

“Good day, Franz,” responded the other carelessly. “I have brought my friend, Herr Auguste, to taste your cider. And how is my little Dorothea?”

He went up to her as he spoke, took her in his arms, and kissed her on the forehead. The young girl submitted to the embrace with an unconsciousness which was more innocent than any show of bashfulness. Then he turned to his companion.

“Here, Auguste, let me present you to the Fräulein.”

The elder man gravely lifted his hat and bowed. Dorothea returned a deep curtsey, and then made a movement towards the door of the cottage.

“I will go into the house and get another glass for Herr Auguste,” she said to the one who was called Maurice.

He nodded, and, beckoning his friend to follow, led the way to a corner of the garden, where a quaint, old-fashioned arbour made a pleasant nook to shelter in from the glare of the sun outside. In the arbour stood a rustic table, formed out of a broad slice sawn off the trunk of an oak tree, and still retaining the bark round its uneven edge. It was supported by an upright log, cut, perhaps, from a branch of the same tree. The table was set out with a tall silver flagon of antique workmanship, and a long narrow goblet of dark green glass of a manufacture peculiar to the district. The two men seated themselves on a bench of materials to match the table, and gazed thoughtfully at one another for a moment without speaking.

Presently Maurice raised his hand and gave the other a playful tap on the shoulder.

“Come, Auguste, why so serious? What do you think of my favourite, now you have seen her? Remember, I want you to tell me frankly.”

Auguste played with the glass goblet, and looked away from his friend’s eyes.

“I am wondering what would happen if I were to take you at your word,” he answered, with a smile of some cynicism.

“What do you mean?”

“It is easy to ask for a frank opinion. It is not so easy to receive it, when it does not happen to be the one we want.”

“Auguste! Why do you talk like that? Surely you cannot help liking her?”

The other man shook off his moody fit, and sat upright.

“She is perfectly charming, my dear friend. You have discovered a gem. I am only trying to think what you will do with it.”

The young man gave a dissatisfied frown.

“How long have you learned to be so discreet?” he said in a tone of reproach. “What have we to do with the future? Surely it is enough to enjoy this moment while it lasts? Since I found out this delightful spot, I have been happy. Your absence has been my only cause of regret; and even that I have forgotten during the hours I have spent here in the company of this beautiful child.”

“Ah,” murmured the other, with a touch of sadness, “the sunshine of love soon puts out the fire of friendship.”

“No, no,” protested Maurice, eagerly. “Do you trust me so little after all these years? When have I ever doubted you?”

He spoke earnestly. The elder man was moved. Laying his hand gently on his friend’s arm, he said softly—

“I know. You must forgive my jealousy. The only wonder is that I have had you to myself for so long.”

“And you have still. Believe me, you do not understand my feelings towards this child. Love? I hardly know whether it is love or not. And she? She, I am certain, has never guessed what brings me here day after day. I almost wish she did. I am afraid sometimes lest, if I ever speak to her of love, I shall frighten her from me altogether, like some timid bird.”

He broke off, catching the sound of footsteps on the gravel path outside. The next moment Dorothea herself appeared under the archway which led into the arbour, framed like a picture in the green trellis-work. She bore in her hand a second goblet, like the first, but with a small piece chipped out of the rim.

“You must excuse the flaw, sir,” she said, with a bright smile, as she set it down before Herr Auguste. “It was done by my cousin Johann when he was a boy.”

Rising from his seat at this moment, Maurice moved to the other side of the table, and invited Dorothea to take the place by his side; but she preferred to remain standing, and busied herself in pouring out cider for her guests. Auguste kept his eyes fixed on the pair, and shrewdly noted everything as he sipped from time to time at the pale straw-coloured beverage in the cool green chalice.

The other two kept up a half-confidential chat, during which old Franz drew slowly near, and took up a post of observation on the path outside. His face wore an expression of satisfaction, though he threw an occasional glance of suspicion at Auguste.

Suddenly, during a pause in the conversation, Maurice bethought himself, and slipped one hand into the pocket of his jacket.

“See,” he said, drawing into view a small parcel wrapped in tissue paper, “I have brought you a keepsake.”

Dorothea’s eyes sparkled. Half eagerly, half timidly, she held out her hand.

Laughingly the young man placed the packet in her outstretched palm. She tore off the wrappings, and the next instant was gazing in breathless delight at a tiny brooch, which had a bright yellow carbuncle in the centre, set round with a ring of white petals, each of them represented by a pearl.

“It is a daisy! Oh, how beautiful!” she exclaimed. “Look, father; see what Herr Maurice has given me!”

And before Maurice could check the movement, she had darted out of the arbour to show her treasure to the forester.

Franz weighed it in his hand, and inspected it with the careful eye of a dealer.

“The Herr is very generous,” he remarked approvingly. “It must be worth at least a hundred florins.”

Auguste, who overheard him, could not forbear a smile. He knew that the little brooch had been specially manufactured by the most famous jeweller in Paris, and that it had taken weeks to bring together the perfectly shaped gems which formed the petals of the flower.

But Dorothea had been appalled by the magnitude of the sum named by her father. She came back slowly, and gazed at Maurice with a look of shy alarm.

“It is too good for me,” she said doubtfully. “You might have given it to one of the ladies up at the Castle.”

Maurice laughed.

“Yes, I think I might have prevailed on one of them to accept it—what do you say, Auguste?”

“I do not know one lady of the Court on whom it would look better than on the Fräulein,” was the response.

“Come, let me see it on your neck,” said Maurice. “I think I am entitled to fasten it in its place.”

He went towards her for the purpose; and Auguste, glancing round to see if the forester were still about, strolled out of the arbour and joined him.

Left alone with Dorothea, Maurice took a more caressing tone; and the young girl, on her side, seemed to feel more at her ease. They sat side by side, and talked to each other in low tones which could not be heard outside.

After a little while, however, Dorothea noticed that her companion was in a more serious mood than was his wont. Some change seemed to have come over him, and now and again she caught him gazing at her with a meditative air, as if he wished to say something, but were doubtful how to begin.

At length, after a longer pause than usual, he said slowly—

“Have you ever been away from here, Dorothea? Have you seen anything of the outside world?”

“Oh, yes,” she answered readily. “I often go into the village, and once or twice father has taken me to Dresselburg.” This was the name of a small market town some seven miles away. “Besides,” she added, “I sometimes go to the Castle when the Court is not there, and see all over it.”

“Ah!” The young man’s face brightened, as if he had found the opening he sought. “Do you like the Castle? Do you think you should care to come and live there yourself, and see the Court as well?”

Dorothea’s blue eyes grew round with awe.

“Oh!” she cried breathlessly, too overcome by the suggestion to take it in all at once. But the next moment she gave her head a shake which stirred all the little golden curls that fringed her face. “I do not think I should like it,” she said. “I should be afraid of all those people. And King Maximilian—if he were to speak to me I think I should sink into the earth.”

A frown crossed the young man’s face.

“Is Maximilian so very terrible, then?” he asked. “Has any one taught you to dread him?”

“No, no. It is not that. But it is because he is the King. I should feel afraid of him—I do not know why. And yet I have often wished that I could see him, if I could be hidden behind something, so that he would not know I was there.”

“You do not feel unkindly towards him, then?”

“Unkindly? Oh, no! How could I, when he is our King? I bless him every night when I say my prayers, and ask God not to let him go mad, like his father.”

The young man trembled. He allowed one or two minutes to go by in silence, and when he spoke again his voice was low and indistinct.

“Do you think,” he said slowly—“do people say, that there is any likelihood of that?”

“I never heard that,” was the answer. “But of course it is in the blood, and they say that when that is so, it may break out at any moment. Do you think it is true that Doctor Krauss, the great mind doctor, is always on the watch, and follows the King secretly wherever he goes?”

She stopped, surprised at the agitation of her companion, who had buried his face in his hands, and was stifling a groan.

“What is it, Herr Maurice?” she asked anxiously. “Are you ill? Shall I call father?”

“No. Say nothing. Take no notice.”

And he got up abruptly, and made his way out of the arbour.

In the mean time Herr Auguste had gone for a stroll round the garden with old Franz.

On the way he engaged in conversation about Dorothea.

“How old is your daughter?” he began.

“Just seventeen, Excellency.”

“Do not call me that,” said the other quickly. “I have no title, except plain Herr.”

“As the Herr pleases,” returned the forester bowing, with evident incredulity. “Dorothea is a good girl,” he added. “She does what her father tells her, in everything.”

“Humph! And pray what is to be the end of this?” He jerked his hand back in the direction of the arbour.

The old man assumed a look of impenetrable stupidity.

“I do not understand. Herr Maurice is very kind and generous. He comes here often, and has made us many presents.”

“Nonsense, man! That is not the way to talk to me. Do you think I am blind? But perhaps I ought to tell you my name, and then you may know who I am. Have you heard of Auguste Bernal?”

Franz bowed with deep respect. The name was well known to every one connected with the Court.

“His Majesty’s friend?” he said.

“Yes. Understand that my only interest in this matter is a friendly one. I wish no ill to you or your charming little daughter. But what advice am I to give to my friend Maurice? You are not a fool, and you must know what an affair like this is likely to lead to.”

The forester drew himself up and gave his questioner a cunning leer.

“I have seen to that,” he said. “I have spoken to Herr Maurice already. He has promised to make me Ranger of the forest, and to settle a pension on Dorothea for life.”

He spoke with an air of pride, like one who feels that he has done everything that can reasonably be expected of him, and come well out of a trying situation.

Bernal turned on him a look of the most profound disgust, which the forester was too absorbed in his inward self-gratulation to perceive. They walked on in silence for a short time.

“Your daughter does not understand the meaning of these attentions yet,” remarked Bernal, presently.

The father shrugged his shoulders.

“She has been well brought up,” was the response.

“By you?” asked the other, dryly.

Franz nodded, with perfect unconsciousness.

“And by her mother,” he added. “She died three years ago next midsummer.”

“Poor child!” murmured Bernal.

By this time they had completed a circuit, and were again drawing near to the arbour, from which they were in time to see the young man rush out, looking deeply disturbed. Auguste quickened his steps to come up to his friend, whom he took affectionately by the arm.

“Has anything happened?” he inquired in low tones.

“No, nothing. Do not ask me about it. It was only an accidental remark which jarred on me. But it is time for us to be going.”

Dorothea came out to them with wonder and concern written on her face.

“Good-bye, little one,” said Maurice, tenderly; and once more he embraced her.

She looked up at him humbly.

“I have not offended you, sir? You will come again?” she pleaded.

“My dear little creature, you offend me! Of course I shall come again. You do look forward to my visits, then?” he said, with a brighter face.

“Very much, sir; and so does father.”

“Ah! Well, good-bye.”

He took a step from her.

“Thank the Herr Maurice for his handsome present before he goes,” came in the tones of a drill-sergeant from the forester.

Before Dorothea could obey, Maurice had seized his friend’s arm, and was walking rapidly towards the gate, with Franz hurrying after them to open it.

Dorothea followed more slowly, and stood there beside her father to watch the two visitors disappearing among the trees.

While they were still absorbed in gazing at the opening down which the others had vanished, Dorothea gradually became aware of some subtle change in the landscape. At first she thought it must be a chillness in the air; then she fancied a cloud must have passed across the drooping sun. But no, the bright sunshine still lay on the forest, and bathed the sward before the garden gate. What was it, then? As she withdrew her eyes from the spot on which they had been fixed, she perceived with a start what had been knocking, as it were, at the door of her consciousness.

A long dark shadow, the shadow of a man coming with noiseless steps, had stolen across the grass in front of where she stood, and lay like a black pointing finger on the ground.

CHAPTER II
THE SPY

Dorothea and her father both looked round and caught sight of the new-comer at the same moment. They saw a tall, handsome fellow of about thirty, dressed like an artisan of good standing. The dust on his boots showed that he had walked a long way. His dark, firmly stamped features bore the marks of thought and endurance, and his whole bearing was bold, resolute—almost defiant.

Old Franz drew back with a scowl as this stranger presented himself before the gate. But Dorothea, after one look at his face, gave a glad cry, and, darting through the gateway, clasped her arms round his neck and kissed him on both cheeks.

The young man received her embrace with an indulgent smile, while he turned a stern glance on the forester.

“Father,” exclaimed Dorothea, releasing her hold, “don’t you see? It is Johann!”

“Yes, I see it’s Johann,” muttered the old man, in a tone half surly and half timorous, as he slowly extended his hand. “And what wind blows you here?” he demanded.

“I had business in the neighbourhood, and I thought Dorothea would be glad to see me,” was the curt response. “But you must say nothing about my visit,” he added, turning to the girl. “No one must know that I have been here.”

Dorothea looked bewildered. Her father gave a dissatisfied grunt.

“More mysteries,” he remarked. “You will get into trouble again one of these days, mark my words. I shouldn’t wonder if you were in some conspiracy at this very moment.”

“Well, uncle, I have not asked you to join in it, anyway,” retorted Johann. “Who are those two men who have just gone into the forest?”

Before answering Franz snatched time to throw a warning look at his daughter, as a hint to keep silence.

“Only two gentlemen from the Castle, who came here to drink a cup of our cider. I don’t want to be brought into disgrace by you and your doings,” he went on hastily, not relishing the new turn to the conversation. “It is bad enough to hear about your goings-on in Mannhausen. I can’t think why they don’t clap the whole lot of you into prison.”

“For what? For demanding that the people may have freedom to better their lot?”

“Oh, don’t talk to me about the people! Old King Leopold knew how to deal with fellows like you. You were afraid of him, but now you have the insolence to attack King Maximilian, who is too good for you. Don’t let me catch you in any of your seditious practices here, that’s all, or the King shall hear of it, as sure as my name’s Franz Gitten.”

The forester spoke bitterly. There is no hatred like the hatred of the favoured servant for those who would enfranchise him against his will. Johann frowned as though he were about to make some angry reply, when Dorothea laid a gentle hand upon his arm, and looked up beseechingly in his face.

“Don’t, Johann! Don’t talk about it any more. Come in and rest after your journey, and have something to eat. We have got a hare pie and a custard.”

The young man’s features relaxed their sternness. He turned and followed her into the house, while Franz resumed his post of sentinel at the gate. But this time the puffs of smoke from the china bowl came in fierce, uneven jerks, and an uneasy frown crossed and recrossed his face.

His daughter led Johann inside the house, into the kitchen, where he seated himself on the old-fashioned settle, while she busied herself in getting ready a meal.

“So gentlemen come here from the Castle, do they?” murmured the young man half to himself. “I wonder what is the attraction that brings them here?”

He glanced at his cousin as she moved lightly to and fro in the sunshine. The yellow beams splashed on her rippling hair like rain falling upon running water.

“How old are you by this time, Dorothea?”

“Seventeen next birthday, Johann. I am making myself a dress with long skirts to go to church in.”

“And where did you get that pretty brooch?”

Dorothea smiled with innocent gratification, as she answered—

“Herr Maurice gave it me—one of those gentlemen you saw going away.”

“Ha!” Johann sat up, alert. “Then this is not the first time they have come here?”

“It is the first time his friend has been here, but Herr Maurice comes nearly every day.”

“Does he? And pray who is this Herr Maurice? What is his surname, and what is he at the Court?”

“We do not know—at least, I don’t, though I sometimes think my father has some idea. But when I ask him he always says that if Herr Maurice wished us to know who he was he would tell us of his own accord.”

“I see. My uncle is prudent. What kind of man is he? Young? Handsome?”

“Oh, no—not young. At least, I should think he was quite thirty.” Johann smiled. “And not so very handsome. There is something in his eyes that almost frightens me sometimes. I fancy he is shy. He often sits thinking by himself, and never says a word.”

Johann looked less and less pleased as he listened, and almost forgot to eat his food.

“Well, do not have too much to say to him, Dorothea. I don’t like gentlemen who do not give their names, and make presents of brooches, and sit thinking by themselves. Do you like him? Should you miss him if he left off coming here?”

Dorothea began to grow uneasy under this fire of questions.

“Miss him? Yes, of course; this place is so lonely that I should miss any one. Do you like the hare?”

“Ay. Is it one of the King’s?”

“You must ask father that. He shot it. But where have you been all this while? and why have you never come here?”

“I have been in the capital working at my trade, of course. They don’t print newspapers in the forest; so, you see, I should starve if I spent much time here.”

Dorothea stole up to him, and whispered a timid question.

“I hope it isn’t true what father said about conspiracies? You don’t really hate the good young King, do you, Johann?”

“I don’t hate any one who is good. But never mind the King. I haven’t come here to talk about him. Give me some cider, if you can spare any from your friend who gives the brooches.”

The young girl gave a swift look at him, then, turning away, with a gesture equally swift she snapped the brooch from her neck, and slipped it into her pocket. Then she went to fetch the cider.

A soon as Johann had refreshed himself sufficiently, he got up, and announced that he must take his departure. Dorothea followed him out to the gate, where her father was still lounging, with a sullen but determined look on his face.

“Where are you going?” was the only remark he vouchsafed by way of farewell to his nephew.

Johann pointed to the path through the woodland, by which the two friends had disappeared. His uncle instantly gripped him by the arm.

“No,” he cried hoarsely; “not that way! Not to the Castle!”

“Why not?” demanded Johann, fiercely. “Are you afraid of my discovering who is the gentleman who has fallen in love with your—cider?”

He pronounced the last word with a sarcastic emphasis which made the old man recoil, and turn a startled glance at Dorothea. The girl was gazing from one to the other with quickly dawning consciousness.

“I had one errand to the Castle already; now I have two,” pursued the young man, pitilessly. “Be assured I will find out this Herr Maurice, and demand an explanation from him.”

“No, no!” exclaimed the alarmed forester, carried away by his fears. “You must not meddle with Herr Maurice. I know who he is.”

Johann’s eyes flashed.

“What? Out with it, man, or it will be the worse for him and you!”

The old man gave an anxious glance at his daughter, and then bent forward and whispered two words in his nephew’s ear. His caution was thrown away.

“The King! I might have known it was that cursed race!”

And without even looking at Dorothea, Johann threw wide the gate, and strode on into the depth of the forest.

His first rush of anger worn off, Johann went forward steadily, shaping his course straight towards the royal palace, and walking with the step of one who has an errand of weight.