She paused before she went on,
“The sentries at the back of the house are so lax that that one could easily slip past them when they are chatting or drinking with one another.”
She laughed and continued,
“Once I am outside the Palace grounds you can pick me up in a carriage and it will be hours before anybody realises that I am not in my own rooms.”
She was silent as if she was thinking before she added,
“I will leave a note for Papa saying I have gone to stay with a friend.”
“His Royal Highness would not believe that and would immediately send the Military to search for you.”
“They would not be likely to find me if I was with you,” Tora replied, “while long before they get really worried we will be back and nobody will ever know where I have been.”
“It does not really sound convincing,” the Professor protested. “Besides, it is wrong.”
“Wrong for whom?” Tora asked. “For me?”
The Professor did not answer her and she put out her hand and laid it on his.
“This is the only way you can help me,” she said, “and, if you love me, do this one thing for me. Nothing could be more important for me, because my whole future is at stake.”
The Professor looked down at her small hand, which looked very delicate and, he thought, very vulnerable.
“You make it very difficult for me,” he said weakly.
“I promise you that no blame will ever be attached to you,” Tora said, “and if I do have to marry the King, I shall make it a condition that you will become the Court musician and play to me every day!”
She smiled brightly as she added,
“And if possible all day, so that I can forget everything except the music you gave me as a gift eight years ago and which you cannot take away from me now.”
The way she spoke was very moving and the Professor gave another groan before he covered her hand with his.
Then he said and his voice sounded hoarse,
“God help me, for I know I shall need it!”
Tora gave a little cry of delight and rose to her feet.
“Then that is settled, Professor,” she said, “and I have a feeling which comes from the depths of my heart and perhaps even my soul that what we are doing is right and the consequences will be right too.”
“The consequences if I am discovered are that I shall either be shot or spend the rest of my life in prison,” the Professor said gloomily.
Tora laughed.
“Then I shall go to prison with you! As long as they give us a grand piano, it will be less intolerable than being married to the King!”
The Professor laughed as if he could not help it.
“How could I have known, how could I have guessed,” he asked, “that when I came here today to tell you my good news, you would confront me with so alarming a proposal?”
“How can you talk like that?” Tora asked. “You have always told me that courage should be our most important virtue.”
“I meant the courage of our convictions, the courage to proclaim our faith in ourselves,” the Professor replied.
“That also means the courage to do what one knows is right, and perhaps even take risks,” Tora retorted.
The Professor shook his head.
Then, as if he felt he could no longer express himself in words, but only in the melody that seemed to move his fingers without his commanding them to do so, he started to play.
He played a Hungarian song, which was one that Tora knew had been sung by the rebels who revolted against the cruelty of their landlords.
Although many of them had lost their lives in the conflict that followed, improvements had been made and the lives of those who survived were made easier because they had rebelled.
As the Professor played, Tora took up a violin that was lying on the piano, put it under her chin and accompanied him.
Because she had been so well taught and because, as the Professor had said, she was a born musician, she was almost as professional as he was.
She played not only the violin, but also the cello and the piano.
As her bow vibrated across the strings of the violin, the music brought an expression of joy and satisfaction to the Professor’s eyes.
He knew that the Princess was as good a player as Simonida, if not better, and it would be impossible for anybody who heard her play not to be moved by the beauty of the sound.
This he knew in the past had a certain magic that pulled at the heartstrings of those who listened and lifted them up into the sky.
Whenever he gave a concert at which he or his quartet played there was, as the last note died away, that sudden silence which every true musician or actor knows is the greatest tribute they can receive from an audience.
As Tora played now, he knew that she was convincing him that all the lessons he had given her had qualified her a thousand times over to be a part of his celebrated quartet.
It was not her title that mattered, but the fact that she comprised in herself everything that was beautiful and magical in music.
Only as the melody came to an end and the Professor played the last chord did Tora stand very still looking at him with a question in her eyes.
For a moment the Professor did not speak.
Then he said,
“We will go to Salona and if there is a solution, my Princess, to this ghastly problem, we will find it together!”
CHAPTER TWO
Tora lay looking at the open window and waiting for the first faint gold of the dawn to rise behind the snow-capped peaks of the mountains.
It was these mountains that divided Radoslav from Salona.
She had tried to sleep during the night, but she was too excited except to doze off, half-afraid that she would not wake as early as she had to.
She had been surprised, once she had made up her mind to accompany the Professor, how proficient he had been in organising everything to prevent their plan being discovered and her being stopped at the last moment.
She was so close to the old man that she knew he was not only horrified at the idea of her having to marry the King but was also visualising himself as a Knight in shining armour who would save her from the dragon.
That was what she felt she needed, except that the Professor was not really the right person to fight on her behalf.
At the same time she was exceedingly grateful to him, not only for agreeing to take part in such an adventure, but for bringing his practical mind to the organisation of it.
Realising she was absolutely determined that nothing would prevent her from somehow going to Salona to see the King before he actually proposed to her, the Professor thought out every detail in a way that made Tora tell him over and over again how wonderful he was.
He had said,
“First I will arrange for somebody I trust to drive you to The Three Bells, the inn where we shall stay the night before we arrive in Maglic.”
Maglic was the Capital of Salona and Tora had always been told that it was a much more beautiful City than any they had in Radoslav.
But at the moment she was much more concerned with the King than his possessions and she listened as the Professor went on,
“The Three Bells, which is actually situated on the top of the pass between our country and the King’s, is well known. Equally it’s a nice quiet place and nobody there would question your being a member of my quartet.”
Tora realised that he was reassuring her and he went on,
“I am afraid, Your Highness, that you will have to arrive a little earlier than I shall be able to get there, but I don’t think you need be alarmed because it is unlikely there will be any other guests about so early in the morning.”
“I am sure that it is essential for me to get away from the Palace as early as possible,” Tora agreed. “In fact I should leave as soon as it is dawn.”
“I can understand that,” the Professor agreed, “but I think it woul
d be easier for you if you carry no luggage.”
Tora saw the sense of this.
If the sentries saw her leaving with baggage of any sort, they might be curious enough to insist upon opening it in case she was a burglar who was leaving the Palace with something that did not belong to her personally.
It was then that the Professor had an idea that made her laugh.
“Take the case of your cello up to your bedroom, Your Highness,” he said. “Knowing how musical you are nobody would think it surprising. If you fill it with the things you require, I will get Simonida to repack them for you in one of her own trunks.”
It was an idea that would never have entered Tora’s mind and she clapped her hands as she exclaimed,
“Professor, you are brilliant! Tell me what else I should do, so that I shall make no mistakes.”
The Professor paused for a moment and then he said,
“I feel, Your Highness, that even your plainest gowns will attract attention if you are travelling alone or with me. I was therefore wondering if by any chance you possess a national peasant dress?”
Tora gave a cry of joy.
“Of course I have!” she said. “Do you not remember last year when we gave a performance for Papa on his birthday? We were all dressed in Radoslav costumes when we sang and played the folk songs.”
“I had forgotten!” the Professor replied. “Then I suggest, Your Highness, that you wear that costume, but I am sure anyone who sees you will think you are too beautiful to be an ordinary peasant.”
When Tora found the costume hanging in a wardrobe she seldom used, she thought how sensible the Professor had been.
It was a very attractive outfit.
Radoslav, like most of the neighbouring countries, had a special costume of its own, which was not only extremely becoming, but very much more elaborate than that, for instance, of Bosnia or Montenegro.
The skirt was green rather than the usual red and the traditional apron was heavily embroidered round the edge with a variety of brilliant colours, which kept the Radoslav girls sewing many nights before a festival.
Their white blouses were also richly embroidered round the top and when the cold winds blew down from the snows, there was a fringed shawl to wear over their shoulders.
On ordinary occasions the girls wore headdresses of coloured ribbons, but for fetes and Saints’ days there was the addition of a white muslin cap that created a halo at the back of the head.
Tora put this on one side, thinking that it was too spectacular for what she required.
She found, however, a more elaborate arrangement of ribbons and flowers that she thought might come in useful and put it with her other clothes inside the cello case.
Although she knew it was a very clever idea of the Professor’s that she should travel as a peasant, she thought that at the concert she would be expected to be dressed conventionally.
She therefore sought in her wardrobe for a suitable gown.
Finally she chose one that was exquisitely made, but was not ostentatious in any way.
Nevertheless she had a feeling that, although it was of a soft shade of blue, it would accentuate the lights of red in her hair and the whiteness of her skin and it would be impossible for anybody attending the concert not to notice her.
The Professor had already thought of this and he said firmly,
“If you come with me, my Princess, I have decided that for your own safety it would be best for you to be the pianist.”
Tora looked at him enquiringly and he explained,
“For one reason, you will be sideways to the audience and they will see only your profile and secondly I shall play the violin and stand in front of you, so that you are mostly hidden behind me.”
Tora knew that this was sensible and she also thought it was appropriate on this very special occasion that the Professor should be violinist.
It was with the violin that he had made his name, having played with all the great orchestras in Europe.
It was only when he had more or less retired to Radoslav that he founded his own quartet and enjoyed his piano playing just as much when he had made music with his violin, which Tora often thought sounded like the songs of angels.
She was, of course, prepared to do anything and play any instrument the Professor suggested as long as she could accompany him to Salona and she merely asked,
“What are you going to tell the other members of the quartet?”
They were both men and she had played with them on several occasions, the last being at Christmas.
The Professor thought for a moment before he replied,
“I have always believed that people see what they expect to see and the last thing Andrea and Kliment will expect to see is Her Highness the Princess Viktorina travelling with us to Salona.”
Tora waited and the Professor went on,
“I shall tell them that you are a relative of mine who lives at the far end of the country, which is why they have not seen you before, but because you are an outstanding musician, I considered you a perfect replacement for Simonida.”
“Do you think when they see me that they will believe you?”
The Professor laughed.
“Why should they doubt me? I have always, until you tempted me into doing otherwise, been a very truthful man!”
Tora felt reassured not only by the Professor’s reasoning, but by her knowledge that Andrea and Kliment were both getting on in years.
Like the Professor they had to wear glasses in order to read the score, which stood on the music stands in front of them.
“If they are curious,” she said mischievously, “You can always tell them that you know I have an uncanny resemblance to the Princess and perhaps one of my raffish ancestors is responsible!”
“I shall say nothing of the sort!” the Professor replied sharply and Tora thought with a little smile that he was shocked at her suggestion.
She had thought, when she carried the cello case up to her bedroom, that it would be far too big for her purpose, but by the time she had folded her evening gown carefully into it, added her nightgown, a warm coat and the other necessities she required, it was quite difficult to close it.
She then rang the bell and, when it was answered by a housemaid, she ordered her to give the case to a footman and tell him to carry it to the Professor who was waiting for it in the music room.
She knew that the servants would obey her without question, knowing how many hours she spent playing the piano in her own sitting room.
Last night, after her lady’s maid had left her and she had taken her peasant dress from the place where she had hidden it, she had felt her heart beating apprehensively at what lay ahead.
She was well aware that, if it was ever discovered where she had been, both her father and mother would be furious.
And yet, however angry they might be, she would have achieved her objective which was to see the King as he really was and not wrapped in the aura of importance that would surround him as a Sovereign visiting another country.
‘Perhaps I shall have the chance of speaking to him and see how he behaves towards someone he imagines to be just an ordinary musician,’ Tora told herself.
She knew how reserved and haughty her father was on such occasions, making no effort to put those who were presented to him at their ease and usually, she thought, talking down to them in a manner that she had often found embarrassing.
‘It is the last thing I would want in my husband,’ she decided.
Then the idea of marrying a man who was so old and might easily be her father made her shudder.
Now, lying back against the pillows and looking out into the darkness of the night, she thought how often she had gazed at the stars and told herself that one day she would stand beneath them with the man she loved.
He would love her and, because they meant so much to each other, she would think that he took the stars from the sky and placed them in her arms.
Because
she had never been alone with a man, Tora was very ignorant as to how a man behaved when he was in love.
But the books she had read told her that love was something mankind had sought all through the ages and which was a treasure beyond price, something which both men and women had been prepared to die for.
Since last year, when she had been considered grown up and could dispense with her Tutors, the idealistic love that was extolled by the poets and which she found in many of Shakespeare’s plays had preoccupied her mind.
‘That is the love I want,’ she had told herself over and over again, being quite certain that one day she would find it.
Now because she must sacrifice herself for the good of her country, she would be marrying a man who she was quite certain would never be able to give her the love she had dreamed about, the love that even the peasants sang about when they worked in the fields!
“I will not marry him, I will not!” Tora shouted out aloud.
Then she told herself that she must be fair.
She would see the King and try to view him dispassionately as a man rather than a commercial asset for Radoslav.
It was then she saw the first faint fingers of the dawn creeping up the sky and realised that it was time to get up.
She sprang out of bed, washed in cold water and hastily began to dress herself in the attractive peasant costume that one of her Ladies-in-Waiting had purchased for her.
“I do not think it right,” the Baroness had said in a reproving manner, “that Your Highness should pretend to be a mere peasant and I am surprised at the Professor for thinking of anything so incongruous!”
“It is no different from dressing up as Cleopatra or the Queen of Sheba,” Tora had objected.
The Baroness had pressed her thin lips together in a disapproving manner.
She had, however, bought the peasant costume at one of the more expensive shops in the town. It was well made and of fine material and Tora had thought it extremely attractive.
There was no doubt that the Radoslav peasants looked beautiful in all their finery on Saints’ days and holidays.
But even when they were working in the fields in skirts that were faded and patched and in white blouses that had been washed until they were limp, they still held a loveliness that was not to be found in other countries of the Balkans.
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