A Son of the Immortals by Louis Tracy (books for 7th graders txt) π
"You have chosen the only good bit in the painting," he declared stoutly. "Look at the boy's lips. Caravaggio must have modeled them from a girl's. What business has a fellow with pouting red lips like them to wear a sword on his thigh?"
Joan laughed with joyousness that was good to hear.
"Pooh! Run away and smite that ball with a long stick!" she said.
"Hum! More than the Italian could have done."
He was ridiculously in earnest. Joan colored suddenly and busied herself with tubes of paint. She believed he was jealous of the handsome Lombard. She began to mix some pigments on the palette. Delgrado, already regretting an inexplicable outburst, turned from the picture and looked at Murillo's "woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a diadem of twelve stars."
"Now, please help me to appreciate that and you will find me a willing student," he murmured.
But Joan had recovered her self-possession. "Suppose we come off the h
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"I heard his Excellency Prince Michael say something of the sort to the officer of the guard, your Majesty."
The random shot had told. Alec felt that he was spinning a coin with fortune.
"That is right," he said coolly. "Give my compliments to Monsieur Beliani, and ask him to oblige me by coming here for a moment; Prince Michael and Count Marulitch, too. Tell all three that I am ready to attend at once to the matter mentioned in Monsieur Beliani's note."
The servant disappeared. Beaumanoir, who, of course, did not understand the instructions given to the man, was fumigating Beliani's letter with rapid puffs of smoke, and incidentally scratching the back of his right ear.
"Rum go this, Alec!" he began.
"Not a word now. You'll stand by me, Berty, I know. Go to my mother's suite and tell Bosko I want him instantly. Bid him bring a brace of revolvers, and see that they are loaded. Come here yourself with some ropes, leather straps, anything that will serve to truss a man securely, as soon as you are sure that Michael, Julius, and the Greek are safely in the room."
Beaumanoir scented a row. Lest any words of his might stop it, he vanished. He must have hurried, too, since Bosko had joined his master before Beliani's messenger reached the anxious conspirators with Alec's answer. There was no need to ask if the Albanian had brought the weapons. They were tucked ostentatiously in his belt. Alec looked him squarely in the eyes.
"I think I can depend on you, Bosko," said he.
"Oui, monsieur."
"Understand, then, that I am no longer King of Kosnovia. I am not Prince Michael's son. I mean to leave Delgratz to-night, and there is a plot on foot to prevent my departure except on terms to which I shall not agree. Will you help me to defeat it?"
"Oui, monsieur."
"Within the next minute I shall probably have visitors. They may show fight, though I doubt it, I want you to place those two pistols among the clothes in that portmanteau, and be busy, apparently, in arranging its contents. When I close the door, you must spring up and cover them with both revolvers. Do not shoot without my command; but make it clear by your manner that their lives are at your mercy. Will you do this?"
"Oui, monsieur," said Bosko.
"Here they are, then. Be ready!"
The door was ajar, and footsteps sounded on the stairs. Some one knocked.
"Come in," said Alec cordially.
Beliani was the first to enter. He pushed the door wide open to assure himself that he was not walking into a trap. He saw Bosko on his knees, rummaging in a trunk, and Alec standing in the middle of the room, lighting a cigarette.
"Come in," said Alec again. "My departure is rather hurried, as you know, and I have not a minute to spare. Have you brought the necessary documents?"
"It is a simple matter," said the Greek, advancing confidently. "Half a sheet of notepaper with your signature and our indorsement as witnesses will suffice."
Prince Michael and Julius, reassured by Alec's manner, and thanking the propitious stars that had rendered unnecessary the dangerous step they were contemplating, entered the room with as businesslike an air as they could assume at a crisis so fraught with import to their own future.
"We ought to be alone," said Beliani in English, with a wary glance at Bosko.
"Oh, for goodness' sake don't disturb my man! I have so little time and so much to do! Tell me exactly what you want me to sign," and he strode to the door and closed it behind Marulitch.
The eyes of the three were on him and not on the harmless looking attendant. During those few seconds they were completely deceived.
Prince Michael, finding the path so easy, took the lead. "Just a formal renunciation of the crown," he said. "Give as your reason, if you choose, your inability to fall in with the expressed desire of the Cabinet that you should marry a Serbian lady. It is essential that you should name meββ"
The door opened and Lord Adalbert Beaumanoir came in leisurely. He carried an assortment of straps, rifled from leather trunks and hatboxes. He saw the three men facing Alec, and behind them Bosko's leveled revolvers.
"Not a bally rope to be had, dear boy; but here's leather enough to go round," he grinned. "By gad! what a tableau! I suppose you mean to gag 'em and then tie 'em back to back, eh, what?"
Alec picked up a chair. "Yes," he said. "Begin with his Excellency Prince Michael."
Julius Marulitch's right hand sought the pocket of the dinner jacket he was wearing.
"No, Julius," said Alec pleasantly, "move an inch and you are a dead man. Bosko has my orders, and he will obey them. You may look at him if you doubt my word."
Marulitch's well poised head had never before turned so quickly; but he shrank from a wicked looking muzzle pointed straight between his eyes. In such circumstances, the caliber of a revolver seems to become magnified to absurdly large proportions, and behind the fearsome weapon Bosko's immovable face was that of an automaton.
Beliani's olive complexion assumed a sickly green tint for the second time that evening. "I was right," he muttered; "but you would not listen."
"It is a common delusion of the thief that an honest man has no brains," said Alec coolly. "Now, Beaumanoir, get busy. Time is flying, and we have little more than an hour to spare."
Prince Michael, never noted for his courage, began to whimper some words of expostulation; but Beaumanoir's strong hands soon silenced him with an improvised gag, for the effeminate little rascal realized that his jaw might be broken if he resisted the stuffing of a towel into his mouth. In a few minutes the three were seated on the floor, securely bound, and unable to utter more than a gurgling cry, which would certainly not be heard by any one passing along the outer corridor.
Alec's cheerful explanation of his action must have been particularly galling. "You will remain here until such time as Stampoff decides that you may safely be set at liberty," he said. "Not you, but he, must provide for the future good government in Kosnovia."
"Thanks, Beaumanoir," he added, turning from the discomfited trio with a carelessness that showed they gave him no further concern. "Better be off now and get ready. Bosko, mount guard outside the door! Allow no one to enter on any pretext whatsoever!"
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Then he busied himself about the room, followed by vengeful eyes. He had brought little into Kosnovia, and he took little away. The extraordinary simplicity of his life had rendered unnecessary the usual trappings of a King. He had worn no uniform save the plainest of field service garments. He possessed no State attire. His clothes were mostly those which came from Paris, and it amused him now to change rapidly into the very suit in which he had entered Delgratz, an unknown claimant of the Kosnovian throne. Bundling his trunks out into the corridor, he closed and locked the door, and the click of the moving bolt must have sent a tremor through the stiff limbs of the three worthies who lay huddled together inside.
Bidding Bosko hurry over his own preparations, he descended to the courtyard. A number of troopers, standing by their horses' heads, sprang to attention when he appeared.
"You can dismiss your men," he said to the officer in charge. "They will not be needed to-night."
Then he told an attendant to order a couple of carriages for half-past eleven. In the reception room he wrote a hasty note to Stampoff:
My Dear Paul:βThe legitimate King of Kosnovia and his heir apparent, not contented with the arrangement entered into in your presence, planned with Beliani a coup d'Γ©tat. I defeated it. You will find all three in my bedroom, the key of which I inclose. They are alive and well, and will stop there until it pleases you to release them. Perhaps you would like to consult with Sergius Nesimir, who by the time you receive this may have recovered the composure so rudely disturbed to-night. At any rate, the next move rests with you. Farewell and good luck.
Outside his mother's apartments he came upon Prince Michael's valet in whispered consultation with Pauline and Princess Delgrado's maid. In the rush of events he had forgotten the two domestics from the Rue Boissière.
"His Excellency will not need your services to-night," he said to the man, "and it will meet his wishes in every respect if nothing is said to the other servants as to the departure of the Princess for Paris."
"Precisely, your Majesty," smirked the Frenchman.
"You, of course," he went on, addressing the maid, "will accompany your mistress."
"Yes, your Majesty," she said, quite reassured by Alec's matter of fact manner.
A glance at Pauline's honest face showed that nothing had been said of the curious scene witnessed in the bureau. To a certain extent, Joan's humble friend shared his confidence, and it was evident that she had not betrayed it.
The departure of such a large party probably created some speculation among the palace servants; but Nesimir did not put in an appearance, and no one dared to question the King's movements. Alec had purposely allowed the barest time for the drive to the station. The midnight train, not being an important express, carried few passengers, mostly traders returning to neighboring towns in Austria after conducting the day's business in Delgratz. The King and his companions, of course, were recognized; but again it was not to be expected that any official would trouble them with inquiries.
Having secured a compartment for his mother and Beaumanoir, Alec made for the station master's office, meaning to obtain a messenger who might be trusted to deliver Stampoff's letter, and he happened to notice a policeman standing near a carriage door.
A white face peered out through the window. It was Sobieski. The King and the waiter were quitting Delgratz by the same train!
Alec laughed, and the policeman saluted. "When the train has gone," said Alec, "I want you to deliver this letter to General Stampoff."
"Yes, your Majesty," replied the man.
"It is important, remember. Here are ten rubles, and ask General Stampoff, with my compliments, for the like amount. Take no denial from his servants. If he is in bed, he must be awaked. Say that I sent you, and there should be no difficulty."
Precisely at midnight the train started. Quickly gathering speed, it ran through the tumbledown suburbs of the city and rumbled across the iron bridge that spans the Tave River. In twenty minutes it was at Semlin, and Austrian officials were examining passports. It was almost ludicrous to find that they gave Alec and his mother a perfunctory glance; but Lord Adalbert Beaumanoir excited their lively suspicion. One man, in particular, mounted guard outside the carriage, and did not budge till the train moved on again.
"That chap remembers me," said Beaumanoir. "Did you notice how he glared? He was the johnny I slung through the window."
At an early hour in the morning Joan was peering disconsolately through the window of a railway carriage at the life and bustle of Budapest station. Felix had gone to purchase some newspapers, and the girl was absorbed in gray thought when an official thrust head and shoulders into the compartment and asked if the FrΓ€ulein Vernon, passenger from Delgratz to Paris, was within.
"Yes," gasped Joan, all the slight color flying from her cheeks and leaving her wan indeed.
"Here is a telegram for you, frΓ€ulein," said the man politely, and his
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