CHAPTER XXXIII
THE FLIGHT OF THE LITTLE PLAYMATE
We carried Dessauer back to the boat with the utmost tenderness, thePrince walking by his side, and oft-times taking his hand. I followedbehind them, more than a little sad to think that my troubles should havecaused so good and true a man so dangerous a wound. For though in a youngman the scalp-wound would have healed in a week, in a man of the HighCouncillor's age and delicacy of constitution it might have the mostserious effects.
But Dessauer himself made light of it.
"I needed a leech to bleed me," he said. "I was coward enough to put offthe kindly surgery, and here our young friend has provided me onewithout cost. His last operation, too, and so no fee to pay. I am afortunate man."
We came to the gate of the Palace of Plassenburg.
My Lady Princess met us, pale and obviously anxious, with lips compressedand a strange cold glitter in her emerald eyes.
"So strange a thing has happened!" she began.
"No stranger than hath happened to us," cried the Prince.
"Why, what hath happened to you?" she demanded, quickly.
"Your fine Von Reuss has proved himself a traitor. He fought a duel withHugo here all tricked in chain-armor, and when found out he whistled hisrascals from the covert to slay us. But we bested him, and he is over thehill, with Jorian and Boris hot after his heel."
"And he hath not gone alone!" said the Princess, and her eyes werebrilliant with excitement.
"Not gone alone?" said the Prince. "What do you know about thisblack work?"
"Because Helene, my maid of honor, hath fled to join him," shesaid, looking anxiously at us, like one who perils much upon athrow of the dice.
I laughed aloud. So certain was I of the utter impossibility of thething, that I laughed a laugh of scorn. And I saw the sound of my voicejar the Lady Ysolinde like a blow on the face.
"You do not believe!" she said, standing straight before me.
"I do not believe--I know!" answered I, curtly enough.
"Nevertheless the thing is true," she said, with a curious, pleadingexpression, as if she had been charged with wrong-doing and were clearingherself, though none had accused her by word or look.
"It is most true," the Princess went on. "She fled from the palace anhour before sundown. She was seen mounting a horse belonging to VonReuss at the Wolfmark gate, with two of his men in attendance upon her.She is known to have received a note by the hand of an unknown messengeran hour before."
I did not wait for the permission of the Princess, but tore up thewomen's staircase to Helene's room, where I found nothing out ofplace--not so much as a fold of lace. After a hurried look round I wasabout to leave the room when a crumpled scrap of paper, half hidden by acurtain, caught my eye.
I stooped and picked it up. It was written in an unknown and probablydisguised hand--a hand cumbersome and unclerkly:
"Come to me. Meet me at the Red Tower. I need you."
There was no more; the signature was torn away, and if the letter weregenuine it was more than enough. But no thought of its truth nor of thefalseness of Helene so much as crossed my mind.
To tell the truth, it struck me from the first that the Lady Ysolindemight have placed the letter there herself. So I said nothing about itwhen I descended.
The Prince met me half-way up the stairs.
"Well?" he questioned, bending his thick brows upon me.
"She is gone, certainly," said I; "where or how I do not yet know. Butwith your permission I will pursue and find out."
"Or, I presume, without my permission?" said the Prince.
I nodded, for it was vain to pretend otherwise--foolish, too, withsuch a master.
"Go, then, and God be with you!" he said. "It is a fine thing tobelieve in love."
And in ten minutes I was riding towards the Wolfsberg.
As I went past the great four-square gibbet which had made an end ofRitterdom in Plassenburg, I noted that there was a gathering of thehooded folk--the carrion crows. And lo! there before me, alreadycomfortably a-swing, were our late foes, the two bravoes, and in themiddle the dead Cannstadt tucked up beside them, for all his five hundredyears of ancestry--stamped traitor and coward by the Miller's Son, whominded none of these things, but understood a true man when he met him.
I pounded along my way, and for the first ten miles did well, but theremy horse stumbled and broke a leg in a wretched mole-run widened by thewinter rains. In mercy I had to kill the poor beast, and there I was leftwithout other means of conveyance than my own feet.
It was a long night as I pushed onward through the mire. For presentlyit had come on to rain--a thick, dank rain, which wetted through allcovering, yet fell soft as caressing on the skin.
I took shelter at last in a farm-house with honest folk, who rightwillingly sat up all night about the fire, snoring on chairs and hardsettles that I might have their single sleeping-chamber, where, understrings of onions and odorous dried herbs, I rested well enough. For Iwas dead tired with the excitement and anxiety of the day--and at suchtimes one often sleeps best.
On the morrow I got another horse, but the brute, heavy-footed from theplough, was so slow that, save for the look of the thing, I might just aswell have been afoot.
Nevertheless I pushed towards the town of Thorn, hearing and seeingnaught of my dear Playmate, though, as you may well imagine, I asked atevery wayside place.
It was at the entering in of the strange country of the brick-dust that Imet Jorian and Boris. They were riding excellent horses, unblown, and ingood condition--the which, when I asked how they came by such noblesteeds, they said that a man gave them to them.
"Jorian," said I, sharply, "where have you been?"
"To the city of Thorn," said he, more briskly than was his wont, so thatI knew he had tidings to communicate.
"Saw you the Lady Helene?" I asked, eagerly, of them.
He shook his head, yet pleasantly.
"Nay," said he, "I saw her not. The Red Tower is not a healthy place formen of Plassenburg, nor yet the White Gate and the house of Master Gerardvon Sturm. But Mistress Helene is in safety, so much Boris and I areassured of."
"Not with Von Reuss?" cried I, fear thrilling sudden in my voice that hehad stolen her and now held her in captivity.
Boris held up his hand as a signal that I must not hurry his companion,who was clearly doing his best.
"She is with Gottfried Gottfried, the old man, your father, and issafe."
"Did she go to them of her own free will, or did my father send for her?"I went on, for much depended upon that question.
"Nay," answered Jorian, "that I know not. But certainly she is with him,and safe. The Count, too, is with his uncle, and they say alsosafe--under lock and key."
"Good!" quoth Boris.
"Let us all three go back to Plassenburg forthwith!" cried I.
"Good!" chorussed both of them together, unanimously slapping theirthighs. "Choose one of our horses. He was a good man who gave us them. Wewish we had known. We should have asked him for another when we wereabout it."
Nevertheless, I rode back to Plassenburg on the farmer's beast, sadlyenough, yet somewhat contented. For Helene was with my father, and farsafer, as I judged, than in the palace chambers of Plassenburg, andwithin striking distance of the Lady Ysolinde. And in that I judged notwrong, though the future seemed for a while to belie my confidence.
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