The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope (the read aloud family .txt) 📕

wait them with ropes, to haul them out, and horses. And here, if things go ill, the duke will join them and seek safety by riding; but if all goes well, they will return to the Castle, and have their enemies in a trap. That, sir, is the plan of his Highness for the disposal of the King in case of need. But it is not to be used till the last; for, as we all know, he is not minded to kill the King unless he can, before or soon after, kill you also, sir. Now, sir, I have spoken the truth, as God is my witness, and I pray you to shield me from the vengeance of Duke Michael; for if, after he knows what I have done, I fall into his hands, I shall pray for one thing out of all the world—a speedy death, and that I shall not obtain from him!”

The fellow’s story was rudely told, but our questions supplemented his narrative. What he had told us applied to an armed attack; but if suspicions were aroused, and there came overwhelming force—such, for instance, as I, the King, could bring—the idea of resistance would be abandoned; the King would be quietly murdered and slid down the pipe. And—here comes an ingenious touch—one of the Six would take his place in the cell, and, on the entrance of the searchers, loudly demand release and redress; and Michael, being summoned, would confess to hasty action, but he would say the man had angered him by seeking the favour of a lady in the Castle (this was Antoinette de Mauban) and he had confined him there, as he conceived he, as Lord of Zenda, had right to do. But he was now, on receiving his apology, content to let him go, and so end the gossip which, to his Highness’s annoyance, had arisen concerning a prisoner in Zenda, and had given his visitors the trouble of this enquiry. The visitors, baffled, would retire, and Michael could, at his leisure, dispose of the body of the King.

Sapt, Fritz, and I in my bed, looked round on one another in horror and bewilderment at the cruelty and cunning of the plan. Whether I went in peace or in war, openly at the head of a corps, or secretly by a stealthy assault, the King would be dead before I could come near him. If Michael were stronger and overcame my party, there would be an end. But if I were stronger, I should have no way to punish him, no means of proving any guilt in him without proving my own guilt also. On the other hand, I should be left as King (ah! for a moment my pulse quickened) and it would be for the future to witness the final struggle between him and me. He seemed to have made triumph possible and ruin impossible. At the worst, he would stand as well as he had stood before I crossed his path—with but one man between him and the throne, and that man an impostor; at best, there would be none left to stand against him. I had begun to think that Black Michael was over fond of leaving the fighting to his friends; but now I acknowledged that the brains, if not the arms, of the conspiracy were his.

“Does the King know this?” I asked.

“I and my brother,” answered Johann, “put up the pipe, under the orders of my Lord of Hentzau. He was on guard that day, and the King asked my lord what it meant. ‘Faith,’ he answered, with his airy laugh, ‘it’s a new improvement on the ladder of Jacob, whereby, as you have read, sire, men pass from the earth to heaven. We thought it not meet that your Majesty should go, in case, sire, you must go, by the common route. So we have made you a pretty private passage where the vulgar cannot stare at you or incommode your passage. That, sire, is the meaning of that pipe.’ And he laughed and bowed, and prayed the King’s leave to replenish the King’s glass—for the King was at supper. And the King, though he is a brave man, as are all of his House, grew red and then white as he looked on the pipe and at the merry devil who mocked him. Ah, sir” (and the fellow shuddered), “it is not easy to sleep quiet in the Castle of Zenda, for all of them would as soon cut a man’s throat as play a game at cards; and my Lord Rupert would choose it sooner for a pastime than any other—ay, sooner than he would ruin a woman, though that he loves also.”

The man ceased, and I bade Fritz take him away and have him carefully guarded; and, turning to him, I added:

“If anyone asks you if there is a prisoner in Zenda, you may answer ‘Yes.’ But if any asks who the prisoner is, do not answer. For all my promises will not save you if any man here learns from you the truth as to the prisoner of Zenda. I’ll kill you like a dog if the thing be so much as breathed within the house!”

Then, when he was gone, I looked at Sapt.

“It’s a hard nut!” said I.

“So hard,” said he, shaking his grizzled head, “that as I think, this time next year is like to find you still King of Ruritania!” and he broke out into curses on Michael’s cunning.

I lay back on my pillows.

“There seems to me,” I observed, “to be two ways by which the King can come out of Zenda alive. One is by treachery in the duke’s followers.”

“You can leave that out,” said Sapt.

“I hope not,” I rejoined, “because the other I was about to mention is—by a miracle from heaven!”