The Goose Girl by Harold MacGrath (online e book reading txt) 📕

some king a merry life!" with a wicked gleam in her eyes.

"Frederick of Jugendheit?"

"Is it true that you have not heard yet? I have declined the honor."

"Your highness?"

"My serene highness," with a smile. "This, of course, is as yet a state secret; and my reason for telling you is not a princess', but a woman's. Solve it if you can."

Carmichael fumbled the reins blindly. "They say that he is a handsome young man."

"What has that to do with it? The interest he takes in his kingdom is positively negative. I have learned that he has been to his capital but twice since he was fifteen. He is even now absent on a hunting trip in Bavaria, and his coronation but a few days off. There will be only one king in Jugendheit, and that will be the prince regent."

"He has done tolerably well up to the present," observed Carmichael, welcoming this change. "Jugendheit is prosperous; it has a splendid army. The prince regent is a fine type of man, they say, rugged, patient, frugal and sensible."

"There is an instance where he made a cruel blunder."

"No man is infallible," said he, wondering what this blunder was.

"I suppose not. Look! The artillery is firing."

Boom-boom! They saw the smoke leap from the muzzles of the cannon, and it seemed minutes before the sound reached them.

"I have a fine country, too," she said, with pride; "prosperous, and an army not inferior to that of Jugendheit."

"I was not making comparisons, your Highness."

"I know that, my friend. I was simply speaking from the heart. But I doubt if the prince regent is a better man than our Herbeck."

"I prefer Herbeck, never having met the prince regent. But I have some news for your highness."

"News for me?"

"Yes. I am about to ask for my recall," he said, the idea having come into his mind at that precise moment.

"Your recall?"

Had he been looking at her he would have noticed that the color on her fair cheeks had gone a shade lighter.

"Yes."

"Is not this sudden? it is not very complimentary to Ehrenstein."

"The happiest days in my life have been spent here."

"Then why seek to be recalled?"

"I am essentially a man of action, your Highness. I am growing dull and stupid amid these charming pleasures. Action; I have always been mixed up in some trouble or other. Here it is a round of pleasure from day to day. I long for buffets. I am wicked enough to wish for war."

"Cherchez la femme!" she cried. "There is a woman?"

"Oh, yes!" recklessly.

"Then go to her, my friend, go to her." And she waved her crop over his head as in benediction. "Some day, before you go, I shall ask you all about her." Ah, as if she did not know! But half the charm in life is playing with hidden dangers.

He did not speak, but caught up the reins firmly. She touched her mare on the flank, and the four began trotting, a pace which they maintained as far as the military field. Here they paused, for the scene was animated and full of color. Squadrons of cavalry raced across the field; infantry closed in or deployed; artillery rumbled, wheeled, stopped, unlimbered. Bang-bang! The earth shivered and rocked. Guerdons were flying, bugles were blowing, and sabers were flashing.

"It is beautiful," she cried, "this mimic war."

"May your highness never see aught else!" he replied fervently.

"Yes, yes; you have seen it divested of all its pomp. You have seen it in all its cruelty and horror."

"I have known even the terror of it."

"You were afraid?"

"Many times."

She laughed. It is only the coward who denies fear.

He would certainly ask for his recall or transfer. He was eating his heart out here in Dreiberg.

They began the incline. She did most of the talking, brightly and gaily; but his ears were dull, for the undercurrent passed by him. He was, for the first time, impressed with the fact that the young ladies of the court never accompanied her on her morning rides. There were frequent afternoon excursions, when several ladies and gentlemen rode with her highness, but in the mornings, never.

"Will you return to America?" she queried.

"I shall idle in Paris for a while. I have an idea that there will be war one of these days."

"And which side will you take?"

"I should be a traitor if I fought for France; I should be an ingrate if I fought against her. I should be a spectator, a neutral."

"That would expose you to danger without the right to strike a blow in defense."

"If I were hurt it would be but an accident. War correspondents would run a hundred more risks than I. Oh, I should be careful; I know war too well not to be."

"All this is strange talk for a man who is a confessed lover."

"Pardon me!" his eyes rather empty.

"Why, you tell me there is a woman; and all your talk is about war and danger. These are opposites; please explain."

"There is a woman, but she will not hinder me in any way. She will, in fact, know nothing about it."

"You are a strange lover. I never read anything like you in story-books. Forgive me! I am thoughtless. The subject may be painful to you."

The horses began to pull. Under normal circumstances Carmichael would not have dismounted, but his horse had carried him many miles that morning, and he was a merciful rider. In the war days often had his life depended upon the care of his horse.

"You have been riding hard?"

"No, only far."

"I do not believe that there is a finer horseman in all Ehrenstein than yourself."

"Your highness is very good to say that." Why had he not gone on instead of waiting at the fork?

Within a few hundred yards of the gates he mounted again. And then he saw a lonely figure sitting on the parapet. He would have recognized that square form anywhere. And he welcomed the sight of it.

"Your Highness, do you see that man yonder, on the parapet? We fought in the same cavalry. He is covered with scars. Not one man in a thousand would have gone through what he did and lived."

"Is he an American?"

"By adoption. And may I ask a favor of your highness?"

"Two!" merrily.

"May I present him? It will be the joy of his life."

"Certainly. All brave men interest me."

Grumbach rose up, uncovered, thinking that the riders were going to pass him. But to his surprise his friend Carmichael stopped his horse and beckoned to him.

"Herr Grumbach," said Carmichael, "her serene highness desires me to present you."

Hans was stricken dumb. He knew of no greater honor.

"Mr. Carmichael," she said in English, "tells me that you fought with him in the American war?"

"Yes, Highness."

She plied him with a number of questions; how many battles they had fought in, how many times they had been wounded, how they lived in camp, and so forth; and which was the more powerful engine of war, the infantry or the cavalry.

"The cavalry, Highness," said Hans, without hesitation.

She laughed. "If you had been a foot-soldier, you would have said the infantry; of the artillery, you would have sworn by the cannon."

"That is true, Highness. The three arms are necessary, but there is ever the individual pride in the arm one serves in."

"And that is right. You speak good English," she remarked.

"I have lived more than sixteen years in America, Highness."

"Do you like it there?"

"It is a great country, full of great ideas and great men, Highness."

"And you will go back?"

"Soon, Highness."

The mare, knowing that this was the way home, grew restive and began prancing and pawing the road. She reined in quickly. As she did so, something yellow flashed downward and tinkled as it struck the ground. Grumbach hastened forward.

"My locket," said her highness anxiously.

"It is not broken, Highness," said Grumbach; "only the chain has come apart." Then he handed it to her gravely.

"Thank you!" Her highness put both chain and locket into a small purse which she carried in her belt, touched the mare, and sped up the road, Carmichael following.

Grumbach returned to the parapet. He followed them till they passed out of sight beyond the gates.

"Gott!" he murmured.

His face was as livid as the scar on his head.


CHAPTER XV

THE WRONG MAN


Herbeck dropped his quill, and there was a dream in his eyes. His desk was littered with papers, well covered with ink; flowing sentences, and innumerable figures. He was the watch-dog of the duchy. Never a bill from the Reichstag that did not pass under his cold eye before it went to the duke for his signature, his approval, or veto. Not a copper was needlessly wasted, and never was one held back unnecessarily. Herbeck was just both in great and little things. The commoners could neither fool nor browbeat him.

The dream in his eyes grew; it was tender and kindly. The bar of sunlight lengthened across his desk, and finally passed on. Still he sat there, motionless, rapt. And thus the duke found him. But there was no dream in his eyes; they were cold with implacable anger. He held a letter in his hand and tossed it to Herbeck.

"I shall throw ten thousand men across the frontier to-night, let the consequences be what they may."

"Ten thousand men?" The dream was shattered. War again?

"Read that. It is the second anonymous communication I have received within a week. As the first was truthful, there is no reason to believe this one to be false."

Herbeck read, and he was genuinely startled.

"What do you say to that?" triumphantly.

"This," with that rapid decision which made him the really great tactician he was. "Let them go quietly back to Jugendheit."

"No!" blazed the duke.

"Are we rich enough for war?"

"Always questions, questions! What the devil is my army for if not to uphold my dignity? Herbeck, you shall not argue me out of this."

"Rather let me reason. This is some prank, which I am sure does not concern Ehrenstein in the least. They would never dare enter Dreiberg for aught else. There must be a flaw in our secret service."

"Doubtless."

"I have seen this writing before," said Herbeck. "I shall make it my business to inquire who it is that takes this kindly interest in the affairs of state."

The duke struck the bell violently.

"Summon the chief of the police," he said to the secretary.

"Yes, yes, your Highness, let it be a police affair. This letter does not state the why and wherefore of their presence here."

"It holds enough for me."

"Will your highness leave the matter in my hands?"

"Herbeck, in some things you are weak."

"And in others I am strong," smiled the chancellor. "I am weak when there is talk of war; I am strong when peace is in the balance."

"Is it possible, Herbeck, that