The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection

by George MacDonald Fraser

  I guess I just like contrary women, and Kralta was one. Crooked as a Jesuit’s conscience, as I was to discover, but with a spirit and quality that made you feel it was almost a privilege to mount her – but then, I’ve remarked before that royal breeding tells, and no doubt I’m as impressionable as the next horny peasant. She was a born adventuress, too – aye, the very archetype of all those subtle sirens whom romantic writers love to imagine aboard the Orient Express. I’d barely disentangled myself from those muscular satin limbs, and she’d stopped gasping in what I think was Hungarian and recovered her breath, when she murmured:

  “So … must the secret wait until Vienna?” Her long fingers stroked my stomach, careless-like. “Better there should be nothing between us, nem? Then we can enjoy our journey.” She flirted her lips across my chest. “Why not tell me now?”

  “So that you can call the guard and have me slung out as soon as you’ve heard it? I’ve known women who wouldn’t think twice.”

  “You think I am such a one … after …?” Her stroking hand slid downwards. “Do you not trust me, when I have trusted you … Harry?”

  “Steady, girl! A little decorum, if you please … I’ll tell you, princess –”

  “Kralta …”

  “Aye, well, Kralta … I trust folk as far as I can throw ’em, which in your case,” I fondled a voluptuous handful, “ain’t far, thank God. No, Vienna’ll be soon enough. I ain’t a modest man, but I’m not fool enough to think that you’d continue to play pretty just for the sake of my manly charms … d’you know?”

  “How little you know of women,” says she. “Or rather, how little you know of me.”

  “I know you’re Bismarck’s mistress.” I couldn’t resist touching this condescending madam on a raw spot – but of course it wasn’t.

  “Fat little Stefan has been gossiping, has he?” She sounded amused. “What did he tell you?”

  “Oh, how the German Emperor persuaded you to gallop stout Otto into a cheerful frame of mind – which I’m bound to say you’re well equipped to do.” I gave her bottom a hearty squeeze. “I’ll bet he couples like a cannibal, does he?” Coarse stuff, you see, to put her in her place, but all it provoked was a dry chuckle.

  “Poor Blowitz! Either he is a bad reporter, or he was trying to protect my reputation.” She eased herself up on an elbow and smiled at me bold-eyed. “In fact, His Majesty made no such suggestion; he merely poured out his fears to me, like the garrulous old woman that he is. It was I who suggested, delicately, since the Emperor is easily shocked, that I myself should … refresh Prince Bismarck.”

  Delicacy being her forte, the brazen bitch. “God’s truth – d’you mean you wanted Bismarck? Talk about a glutton for punishment! What on earth possessed you?”

  She gave a little dismissive shrug. “Amusement? Whim? What shall I call it? I am forty years old, immensely rich in my own right, titled and privileged, married to a dull nonentity … and bored beyond belief. It follows that I seek diversion, excitement, pleasure, and above all, novelty. When a new sensation offers, I pursue it … as you have discovered.” She teased her lips across mine. “That is what possessed me.”

  “I’ll be damned! You didn’t tell that to the Emperor, I’ll be bound! What did he say?”

  “Oh, men are such hypocrites! He pretended not to understand … but he did everything in his power to smooth my way to Schonhausen – secret arrangements, agents to conduct me, my husband sent off on a fool’s errand.” She gave a well-bred sneer. “A professional procurer could have done no more! And so … Bismarck was, as you say, ‘galloped’ into a good humour, the Emperor was pleased and grateful, and I,” says she, sitting up and stretching wantonly, poonts at the high port, “enjoyed the supreme gratification of having the most powerful man in the world panting for me in his shirt-tail.”

  See why I said it was a privilege to mount her? There ain’t many women as shameless as I am – and by gum she was proud of it. Of course I was bound to ask how the most powerful man in the world had performed, and she shrugged, laughing.

  “Oh, very active … for his age. And very Prussian, which is to say gross and greedy. An ageing bull, without refinement or subtlety.” She was one to talk. “As the French philosopher said, it was an interesting experience, but not one to be repeated. Now I,” her eyes narrowed and the ripe lower lip drooped as she reclined beside me again, her hands questing across my body, “am devoted to repetition, and so, I believe, are you … ah, but indeed you are! And since I did not decoy you from London only to find out silly secrets …” she slid a strapping thigh across my hips, gasped sharply in Hungarian, and began to plunge up and down “… oh, let us repeat ourselves, again, and again, and again …!”

  So we did, as the Orient Express thundered on towards distant Strasbourg, myself rapturously content to lend support, so to speak, while royalty revelled in the joys of good hard work. God knows how Bismarck had stood it at his time of life, and I remember thinking that if one had wanted to assassinate him, Kralta could have given him a happier despatch than the old bastard deserved.12

  * * *

  a See Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, which recounts, inter alia, his adventures with the Kuklos, the forerunner of the infamous Ku Klux Klan, and its leaders, who styled themselves Atropos, Clotho, and Lachesis – the Three Fates of mythology.

  Chapter 4

  Clanks and whistles and a shocking cramp in my old thigh wound awoke me as we pulled in past the Porte de Saverne to Strasbourg station, and when I tried to move, I couldn’t, because Kralta was sleeping on top of me – hence my aching limb, trapped beneath buxom royalty. That’s the drawback to railroad rattling: when you’ve walloped yourselves to a standstill there’s no room to doze off contentedly rump to rump, and you must sleep catch-as-catch-can. Fortunately she soon came awake, and I heard the rustle of her furs as she slipped out into the corridor, leaving me to knead my leg into action, sigh happily at the recollection of a rewarding night’s activity, raise the blind for a peep at the station, and groan at the discovery from the platform clock that it was only ten to five.

  The place was bustling even at that ungodly hour, with some sort of reception for our passengers, and I remembered Blowitz had talked of a dawn excursion. There he was, sure enough, well to the fore with Nagelmacker and a gang of tile-tipping dignitaries; he was trying to be the life and soul as usual, but looking desperate seedy after all his sluicing and guzzling, which was a cheering sight. If I’d known then that the Strasbourg river is called the Ill, I’d have called to him to have a look at it, as suiting his condition.

  That reminded me that I was in urgent need of the usual offices, and I was about to lower the blind when my eye was caught by a chap sauntering along the platform, valise in hand, a tall youthful figure, somewhat of a swell with his long sheepskin-collared coat thrown back from his shoulders, stylishly tilted hat shading his face, ebony cane, a bloom in his lapel, and a black cigarette in a long amber holder. Bit of a Continental fritillary, but there was something in the cut of his jib that seemed distantly familiar as he strolled leisurely by. Couldn’t be anyone I knew, and I put it down as a fleeting likeness to any one of a hundred subalterns in the past, lowered the blind, drew on shirt and trousers, and hobbled out to seek relief.

  When I returned, the little maid had set out a tray of coffee, hot milk, and petit pain, and was plumping the pillows and smoothing the sheets of the berth. Kralta was in the chair, her robe about her, perfectly groomed and bidding me an impersonal good day as though she’d never thrashed about in ecstatic frenzy in her life.

  “Early as it is, I thought a petit déjeuner would not be amiss,” says she. “Manon has made up a berth for you in the next cabin, so that you may sleep until a more tolerable hour, as I shall.” The maid poured coffee for me and milk for her mistress, and waited on us while we ate and drank in silence – Kralta poised and dignified as befitting royalty en déshabillé, Flashy half-conscious as usual when rousted out at 5 a.m. I was gl
ad of the coffee, and finished the pot; worn as I was with lack of sleep and Kralta’s attentions, I knew it would take more than a pint of Turkish to keep me awake.

  When we’d finished, Manon removed the tray, and I was preparing to take my weary leave when Kralta stopped me with a hand on my sleeve. She said nothing, but put her hands up to my cheeks, appraising me in that shall-I-buy-the-brute-or-not style – and then she was kissing me with startling passion, mouth wide, lips working hungrily, tongue halfway to breakfast. Tuckered or not, I was game if she was, and I was delving under the fur for her fleshpots when she pulled gently away, pecked me on the cheek, murmured “Later … we have Vienna,” and before I knew it I was in the corridor and her lock was clicking home.

  I was too tired to mind. The lower berth in the next cabin was turned down and looked so inviting that I dragged off my duds any old how and crawled in gratefully, reflecting that the Orient Express was an Al train, and Kralta, the teasing horse-faced baggage with her splendid assets, was just the freight for it … and Vienna lay ahead. Even as my head touched the pillow the train gave a clank and shudder, and then we were gliding away again, and I was preparing for sleep by saying my prayers like a good boy, their purport being the pious hope that I hadn’t forgotten any of the positions Fetnab had taught me on the Grand Trunk, and which I’d rehearsed with Mrs What’s-her-name in the ruined temple by Meerut, and would certainly demonstrate to Kralta as soon as we found a bed with a decentish bit of romping room in it …

  I expected to sleep soundly, but didn’t, for I was troubled by a most vivid dream, one of those odd ones in which you’re sure you’re awake because the surroundings of the dream are those in which you went to sleep. There I was in my berth on the Orient Express, stark beneath the coverlet, with sunlit autumn countryside going past the window, and near at hand two people were talking, Kralta and an Englishman, and I knew he was a public school man because although they spoke in German he used occasional slang, and there was no mistaking his nil admirari drawl. I couldn’t see them, and it was the strangest conversation, in which they chaffed each other with a vulgar freedom which wasn’t like Kralta at all, somehow. She said of course she’d made love to me, twice, and the man laughed and said she was a slut, and she said lightly, no such thing, she was a female rake, and he was just jealous. He said if he were jealous of all her lovers he’d have blown his brains out long ago, and they both seemed amused.

  Then their voices were much closer, and Kralta said: “I wonder how he’ll take it?”, and the man said: “He’ll have no choice.” Then she said: “He may be dangerous,” and the man said the queerest thing: that any man whose name could make Bismarck grit his teeth was liable to be dangerous. The dream ended there, and I must have slept on, for when I woke, sure enough I was still in the berth, but somehow I knew that time had gone by … but why was there no feeling in my legs, and who was the chap in the armchair, smoking a black gasper in an amber holder, and rising and smiling as I strove to sit up but couldn’t? Of course! He was the young boulevardier I’d seen on Strasbourg station … but what the hell was he doing here, and what was the matter with my legs?

  “Back to life!” cries he. “There now, don’t stir. Be aisy, as the Irishman said, an’ if yez can’t be aisy, be as aisy as ye can. Here, take a pull at this.” The sharp taste of spa water cleared my parched throat, if not my wits. “Better, eh? Now, now, gently does it! Who am I, and where’s the delightful Kralta, and what’s to do, and how’s your pater, and so forth?” He chuckled. “All in good time, old fellow. I fancy you’ll need somethin’ stronger than spa when I tell you. Ne’er mind, all’s well, and when you’re up to par we’ll have a bite of luncheon with her highness – I say, though, you’ve made a hit there! Bit of a wild beast, ain’t she? Too strong for my taste, but one has to do the polite with royalty, what?” says this madman cheerfully. “Care for a smoke?”

  I tried again to heave up, flailing my arms feebly, without success – and now my dream came back to me, half-understood, and I knew from the numbness of my limbs that this was no ordinary waking … Kralta, the bitch, must have doctored my coffee, and it had been no dream but reality, and this was the bastard she’d been talking to … about me. And Bismarck …

  “Lie still, damn you!” cries the young spark, grinning with a restraining hand on my shoulder. “You must, you know! For one thing, your legs won’t answer yet awhile, and even if they did, you’re ballock-naked and it’s dam’ parky out and we’re doin’ forty miles an hour. And if you tried to leave the train,” he added soothingly, “I’d be bound to do somethin’ desperate. See?”

  I hadn’t seen his hand move, but now it held a small under-and-over pistol, levelled at me. Then it was gone, and he was lighting a cigarette.

  “So just be patient, there’s a good chap, and you’ll know all about it presently. Sure you won’t smoke? There’s no cause for alarm, ’pon honour. You’re among friends … well, companions, anyway … and I’m goin’ to be your tee-jay and see you right, what?”

  D’you know, in all my fright and bewilderment, it was that piece of schoolboy slang that struck home, so in keeping with his style and speech, and yet so at odds with his looks. He couldn’t be public school, surely … not with those classic features that belong east of Vienna and would be as out of place in England as a Chinaman’s. No, not with that perfect straight nose, chiselled lips, and slightly slanted blue eyes – if this chap wasn’t a Mittel European, I’d never seen one.

  “Tee-jay?” I croaked, and he laughed.

  “Aye … guide, philosopher, and friend – showin’ the new bugs the ropes. What did you call ’em at Rugby? I’m a Wykehamist, you know – and that was your doin’, believe it or not! ’Deed it was!”

  He blew a cloud, grinning at my stupefaction, and the feeling that I’d seen him before hit me harder than ever – the half-jeering smile, the whole devil-may-care carriage of him. But where? When?

  “Oh, yes, you impressed the guv’nor no end!” cries he. “‘It’s an English school for you, my son,’ he told me. ‘Hellish places, by all accounts, rations a Siberian moujik wouldn’t touch, and less civilised behaviour than you’d meet in the Congo, but I’m told there’s no education like it – a lifetime’s trainin’ in knavery packed into six years. No wonder they rule half the world. Why, if I’d been to Eton or Harrow I’d have had Flashman on toast!’ That’s what the guv’nor said!”

  This was incredible. “The … the guv’nor?”

  “As ever was! You and he were sparrin’-partners … oh, ever so long ago, before my time, ages! He wouldn’t tell about it, but he thought you no end of a fellow. ‘If ever you run into Flashman … well, try not to, but if you do, keep him covered, for he’s forgotten more dodges than you’ll ever know,’ he told me once. ‘His great trick is shammin’ fear – don’t you believe it, my boy, for that’s when he’s about to turn tiger.’ I remember he fingered the scar on his brow as he said it. I say, did you give him that?” His eyes were alight with admiration, damned if they weren’t. “You’ll have to tell me about that, you know!”

  My heart had stopped beating some time before. I could only stare at him appalled as the truth dawned.

  “My God! You mean … you’re –”

  “Rupert Willem von Starnberg!” cries he, sticking out his hand. “But you must call me Bill!”

  It’s a backhanded tribute to the memory of the late unlamented Rudi von Starnberg that my first impulse on meeting his offspring was to look for the communication cord and bawl for help. Time was I’d ha’ done both, but when you’ve reached your sixties you’ve either learned to bottle your panic, sit tight, and think like blazes … or you haven’t reached your sixties, mallum?a I didn’t know what the devil was afoot, or why – but I’d heard his name and his threat and seen his Derringer. No wonder he’d seemed familiar: taller, longer in the jaw, straight auburn hair instead of curls, and clean-shaven, but still unmistakable. Rudi’s son … my God, another of him!

  That set
tled one thing. Whatever the ghastly plot, it didn’t signify beside the urgent need to get off this infernal train in one piece, jildi†b and if this brute was anything like dear papa, I’d have my work cut out. You may think his threat was ridiculous, on a civilised railroad carrying respectable passengers through the heart of peaceful Europe. I did not. I knew the family.

  But I must have time to think and find out, so I let him clasp my nerveless hand, assuring me warmly that he’d wanted ever so much to meet me. That was a facer, if you like; Rudi had been as deadly an enemy as I’d ever run from, and dam’ near did for me in the Jotunberg dungeons, and here was this ruffian talking as though we’d been boon companions … and yet, hadn’t that been Rudi all over, carefree villainy with a twinkling eye, clapping your shoulder and stabbing your back together?

  Playing for time, I muttered something idiotic about not knowing Rudi had married, and he laughed heartily.

  “He had to, you see, when I happened along in ’60. You knew mother – Helga Kossuth, lady-in-waitin’ to the Duchess of Strackenz in your time. I’ve heard her speak of you, but nothin’ to a purpose. Kept her counsel, like the guv’nor.”

  They would; imposture and assassination ain’t matters to beguile your infant’s bed-time. I remembered Helga, a lovely red-haired creature whom Rudi had been sparking back in ’48 – evidently with more constancy than I’d have given him credit for. And now the result of their union was watching me with an eye like an epee as I cautiously flexed my toes, feeling the life return to my legs, weighed the distance between us, and asked what time it was.

  “Just past noon; Munich in half an hour – but don’t form any rash plans for gettin’ out there.” He eyed me mockingly. “I’m sure you wouldn’t enjoy ten years in a Bavarian prison. Bad as Rugby, I shouldn’t wonder. Oh, yes,” he continued, enjoying himself, “I have it on excellent authority – Prince Bismarck’s in fact – that a warrant still exists for the arrest of one Flashman, a British subject, on a most serious criminal charge, the rape of one Baroness Pechmann at a house in the Karolinen Platz, Munich, thirty-five years ago. Astonishin’ how youthful peccadilloes come home to roost –”