The Derring-Do Club and the Empire of the Dead

by David Wake

  Somehow the natural order of things had flipped over. The three sisters – little girl, big girl and young lady – had somehow exchanged roles. Whereas Charlotte knew the regulations for little girls and for big girls, she had not as yet heard about how a ‘young lady’ should behave. Indeed, the very mention of whatever that behaviour might be was forbidden to ‘little girls’.

  Charlotte thought she should probably ask.

  “When we’re alone, Prince Pieter… and I, should I call him ‘Pete’?”

  “You will absolutely not.”

  “Do you think he’ll call me Lottie in private?”

  “I imagine he’ll call you by whatever name you’ve stolen.”

  “Oh yes, silly me.”

  “Charlotte, you don’t seem to realise that you are going to be found out.”

  “You don’t value anything I do.”

  “You don’t do anything of value.”

  “The real Princess didn’t want to be a Princess.”

  “Why ever not?”

  “She didn’t want to be bound by duty, because she wanted to run off with a Hauptmann.”

  “Hauptmann? Who’s he?”

  “A Hauptmann is a German Captain, they have three pips on their epaulettes and–”

  “Charlotte!”

  “She said it was going to be a fate worse than death.”

  “Which is now your fate.”

  “Oh, I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

  The castle seemed dark and forbidding for a moment, the stone walls impenetrable and cold, and yet the room had such lovely decorations and beautiful furniture and gilded mirrors with all her wonderful luggage stacked neatly and her pretty dresses hanging in the wardrobe.

  “No, Lottie,” said Earnestine, “you don’t think at all, do you?”

  Chapter VIII

  Miss Deering-Dolittle

  “What is she like?”

  Earnestine stood with her hands folded neatly on her lap and considered Prince Pieter’s question. Her Royal Highness, Princess… Charlotte was the most difficult and impossible trouble–maker imaginable: one who had no concept of responsible behaviour, who smiled as she heaped misfortune upon others as if this was acceptable behaviour – which it was not! Who spent her entire life dedicated to making Earnestine’s existence as difficult as possible.

  Earnestine had liked living in Kensington, but Charlotte’s unruliness meant that their legal guardian, Uncle Jeremiah, had packed all three of them off to boarding school. Earnestine herself had adapted well to the regime and had even made friends, but then Charlotte’s activities with the Boy’s School cadets had meant such disgrace that all three had been sentenced to the Eden College for Young Ladies. In Switzerland. Even then, Earnestine had made the best of it, even becoming a Prefect, and she could see the value of the education that–

  “The Princess,” Pieter repeated: “What’s she like?”

  She’s Charlotte: a silly, silly girl, who had contrived somehow to come between herself and the man in whom she would not be concerned about at all, ever, under any circumstances whatsoever.

  “She’s… young,” said Earnestine.

  “Pretty?”

  Earnestine felt the pain of her back teeth biting the inside of her cheek: “…yes, I suppose.”

  “Intelligent?”

  “No.”

  Maybe, Earnestine thought, she could just do nothing. She liked this idea, even as she knew that she could not as she was cursed with being the responsible Deering–Dolittle, but even so it had a certain charm. This kidnapper (let’s not forget) would be saddled with her silly sister and Earnestine would have the pleasure every Christmas and birthday of seeing him suffer from her impossible scatter–brained schemes, which would serve him right for not having the courage to propose, albeit pointlessly and fruitlessly, to her. Equally delicious was the thought that her foolish sister would be taken in hand, bundled about in great coats and subjected to the horrors of random untoten attacks.

  “I suppose I do not deserve both beauty and wits.”

  “And I suppose she does not deserve kindness and consideration.”

  Pieter was dour: “Do you understand about duty?”

  What a stupid question: of course she understood duty; wasn’t she the responsible adult with two young girls to see safely through a world full of violence and men and fates worse than death?

  “Let me show you my duty,” he said.

  Pieter led her from his suite and down through various rooms. They were empty, opulent to a fault, but sterile and spoke only of former glories now faded. Portraits of harsh men and sullen women cluttered the walls as Pieter’s ancestors jostled for position.

  As if to forestall any questions: “Our family was once prosperous. Austro–Hungary had an empire, but now there’s another family on the throne. We are whittled down to these storerooms of our past.”

  Finally, they reached an unassuming passageway. He had a key on his chain and opened an arched door.

  “This is the command centre,” Pieter said, “with the map of the war.”

  Pieter flicked a brass switch by the door: the bulbs buzzed and flickered, one popped and went out, but the rest shone on with a yellow light.

  Earnestine gasped and felt foolish: although her family home in Kensington used gas lighting, she had lived in London and so she’d seen galvanic lighting.

  The room was small in comparison to others in the castle with an oval table, teak, and matching chairs rather like a dining room. There was enough space to move around the table, but not enough for servants to hover unobtrusively. This was a private room. The decor was fine, dark red with gold filigree on three of the walls, a small, bedroom–sized fireplace on the far side. Electric light bulbs appeared at intervals and the chandelier had been converted too.

  It was the end wall that was different: black. Close inspection revealed the same filigree swirls in relief, so the wallpaper itself had been sacrificed. It was covered in framed and unframed pictures, small portraits, some no more that postcards, arranged with apparent abandon and no regard for a proper pattern or balance. Notes with names and dates in tiny writing were pinned to each, and string, white against the black, had been attached linking picture to picture.

  Earnestine saw Queen Victoria’s image in one of the larger frames, her stern countenance with more string attached than any other picture. Below her was her Prince Edward, the Prince of Wales, and Victoria, her daughter, now the German Empress since her marriage to Kaiser Wilhelm II.

  “It’s a family tree,” she said.

  Pieter clicked his heels: “Excellent.”

  He moved closer like a professor about to deliver a lecture, and the wall took on the aspect of a blackboard. He waved his hand over the left side to include Queen Victoria and her offspring.

  “This,” he explained, “is the territory of the Saxe–Coburg and Gotha. Here, is the realm of Bernadotte, Norway and Sweden under Oscar II.”

  He had to stretch up to indicate a bearded man in a military uniform.

  “Territory?”

  “And down here.”

  Pieter moved his finger to the centre of the wall and pointed to a small, unassuming likeness set below waist height. Earnestine leant forward and saw what she expected: “Pieter.”

  “You have found me.”

  His picture was from a modern daguerreotype that had been cut from a group. A shoulder loomed next to him. The rest of this truncated image was in its own frame, his brother, Graf Gustav Zala, and above, joined by a thread, were other pieces of this jigsaw, a gallant man and a proud woman together in one frame and another woman fixed to one side.

  “My mother and my… father, the Crown Prince.”

  A smear of glue discoloured the Crown Prince’s image where something had been stuck on and then peeled away.

  “This is my step–mother,” Pieter added. “Another alliance after my mother passed on.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I was y
oung.”

  “I don’t see how this is a map of territory,” Earnestine admitted.

  “In Europe, there are two ways territory changes hands: by warfare and by marriage. One country may invade another, annex part of a state, to gain territory.”

  “And the other state loses it.”

  “Indeed. Also a state may lose territory by rebellion. This is warfare.”

  “And by marriage?”

  “See the offspring of Queen Victoria, the grandmother of Europe, connecting with the progeny of King Oscar, the grandfather of Europe: their blood being distilled together like schnapps. A marriage alliance between two states can produce an heir to both thrones, so when a child grows up, then he ascends both thrones and two nations become one.”

  Pieter brought his hands together, locking his fingers to represent these peoples joined together.

  “Not always the case, of course. Inheritance doesn’t always follow the male line. For instance, your Queen Victoria inherited the British Empire, its lands and colonies abroad, but she did not inherit Hanover as she was not a male issue. So that land passed to Prince… King Ernest Augustus I and the House of Hanover.”

  Pieter paused to show that line: King George V, then King Ernest Augustus II.

  Earnestine pointed at the corresponding label.

  “Annexed by Prussia.”

  “Of course.”

  “These two lands could have been one, the British Empire would have territories in the very heart of Europe. Alas, Queen Victoria was a woman.”

  Earnestine bristled: “Alas.”

  “Also, a nation may not accept a foreign ruler.”

  “I can’t see why any nation would.”

  “Your people, the Great British, have accepted a monarch, your Queen Victoria, who is German. Her mother tongue is German. I believe she can speak English, but only as a foreigner. Her own daughter, who became the German Empress and Queen of Prussia, spoke English and, I believe, educated her son, the current German Emperor, Wilhelm II, in English. They speak German as foreigners.”

  “That seems foolish now it’s pointed out.”

  “All royal families are trying to gain alliances, combine thrones, and unite Europe.”

  The arrangement of portraits took on a different meaning. There was a match between these frames and the borders of nations, and the offspring could be seen as their troops, with white supply lines stretching hither and thither. Pieter was then a soldier ready to be sent into battle.

  “I am a pawn,” he said. “This is a chess game and one must make sacrifices.”

  “I see, so our Queen is like the queen in chess.”

  “Yes, and here is the King.”

  Pieter pointed to another portrait high on the wall. Earnestine came forward and stood on her toes, but even so…

  “He is Ernst I, the man behind so many Saxe–Coburg successes: they say the Saxe–Coburg have lost on the battlefield, but won in the bedroom.”

  “I beg your pardon!?”

  “My apologies, it is what they say.”

  She blinked, it must have been the awkward light: “I see.”

  “Ernst was the great manipulator linking so many crowns together.”

  Earnestine saw the tiny cross: “He’s dead.”

  “But he sowed the seeds of the Saxe–Coburg success: see Ernst II, then it would have been Prince Albert, the Consort of Queen Victoria bringing the British throne and the Duchies of Saxe–Coburg and Gotha back together. The law did not allow this, so the Duchies went to Prince Albert’s brother, Alfred. When he committed suicide, it went to the Duke of Albany, son of Queen Victoria’s son, Leopold.”

  “A lot of Royals with the same names.”

  “They are all named after ancestors and to curry favour with other Royal Houses.”

  “And your House?”

  “Here!” The Prince moved to the centre of the wall. “This is the dowager Gräfin. It is she who dictates our strategy, our Grandmistress if you like. She sits here often, as her mother and her mother’s mother, and her mother’s mother’s mother and so on, did before her, and here she considers moves and counter moves.”

  “She looks nice.”

  “This was painted a long time ago.”

  “You said we were similar.”

  Pieter said nothing as Earnestine considered this novel approach to conquest. Queen Victoria gazed down from a few feet away, giving nothing away. Her countenance did resemble that of a studious chess player. The idea made sense; more than that, it was a game that had been played. To devote an entire room to this single endeavour indicated the seriousness with which they considered their strategy.

  “And your move?” she asked.

  Pieter traced a line up across to a pretty girl, who looked nothing like Charlotte even when she was that young: “The Princess who waits above.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “It is not my choice.”

  “No.”

  “My brother, Graf Zala, is destined to Russia. The Tsar Nicholas II has daughters; we have sons. The aim is to bring the Russian throne back into contention.”

  The light flickered: “I see.”

  Earnestine felt heavy, the room with its dark walls and eerie artificial light was oppressive. The pictures of Olga, Tatiana and Maria were those of babies, dressed in Christening robes or, Earnestine thought with a shudder, virginal bridal gowns.

  “They’re babies,” she said.

  “The only pictures we have, but yes, Gustav will have to wait.”

  Earnestine studied the pictures again. She felt a certain sympathy for Olga having to grow up with two younger sisters.

  Earnestine’s own picture was very much not on this wall; indeed, the Deering–Dolittles of Surrey were featured on more hypothetical walls than Earnestine, Georgina and Charlotte of the Kent Deering–Dolittles. Despite their education at the Eden College for Young Ladies, and Miss Hardcastle’s insistence that it improved their prospects, their portraits would never feature on the wall of a drawing room in the Home Counties, let alone that of a royal command chamber.

  “It is not my choice,” Pieter repeated.

  “We all have choices.”

  “Perhaps, but our choice is between my brother and I. I subscribe to the Great Plan, this strategy here, whereas my brother dreams of a Great War, victory and glory. Each method is made up of engagements.”

  “Not likely in this age of Pax Britannica.”

  Pieter shuffled uncomfortably.

  “Why were you hiding in the school?” Earnestine asked.

  “I thought that if I was absent, then my brother would have to marry here,” he pointed at the wall, “or here. With the arms of a beautiful girl around his neck he would be less likely to complete his plans.”

  “Plans?”

  “Nothing of note,” said Pieter, but Earnestine was learning his ways all the time and recognised a lie.

  “There’s more to it than these arranged marriages then?” she asked.

  “I have said too much.”

  Earnestine realised that she had overstretched her forces in the game that they had been playing. She took a moment to examine the wall, tracing the strings and thus all the connections in blood between families. She noticed again the picture of a Princess who looked nothing like Charlotte. This real Royal was a severe looking child, angry and plump, whereas Charlotte’s visage would brighten up this dark wall.

  “One day I will have to marry,” said Pieter. “Mix my blue blood with the blue blood of another royal family.”

  Earnestine felt a sudden irrational loathing all Princesses.

  “You’ll need a couple of new pins and another piece of string,” she said.

  “It does not mean that you and I can’t be together. It is common practice when marrying for duty to love another.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “I can keep some apartments in Vienna or Paris.”

  “I see,” said Earnestine: “Would that be alternating with the Princess
? Would you take Sunday off? Or perhaps I should ask my sister, Georgina, to fill in on the Holy Day and then you could have the full set.”

  “Are you feeling all right?” the Prince asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Perhaps it’s the modern lighting?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Let me get you a glass of brandy.”

  Pieter fetched a glass and bottle, pouring a generous measure: “Here.”

  When he passed the glass to her, he used his left hand, but Earnestine was having none of that coded nonsense and so took it with her right hand. Even so, their fingers touched as she took the offering.

  The liquid was fiery, it burnt her inside as she swallowed, and was much like other fiery, burning sensations that coursed in the very red blood of her veins.

  Miss Georgina

  Caruthers and McKendry had alighted at a railway station to catch a local connection. Once they had reached their starting position, they would await Merryweather’s telegraph. Merryweather and Georgina continued on, arriving at the station below the Eagle’s Claw. Merryweather was tasked with moving supplies along a mountain route and leaving them in a suitable hiding place. He would wire the instructions to Caruthers and McKendry so that they could approach the fortress from above without needing to carry too much equipment. It was a good plan.

  Merryweather bought equipment and Georgina did make sandwiches.

  “Merry, it’s foolish.”

  “I don’t mind making two trips.”

  “Yes, but I can carry a rucksack.”

  “I d– don’t–”

  “That’s settled then.”

  She added climbing boots and a tweed mountain dress to the shopping list.

  Her rucksack was considerably lighter than Merryweather’s and he hired a trap to take them part of the way.

  “We should leave the supplies here,” Merryweather suggested.

  “Nonsense, Merry,” Georgina replied, “a little further.”

  They moved along the path at the base of the cliff, working towards the ascent route that Merryweather had chosen, until at times they could spy the castle itself, high and foreboding, ahead.