Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07

by The Second Seal

  The inevitable formal courtesies were exchanged, then her cousin took her into dinner: De Richleau followed with the Chotek, but at table had Ilona on his other side. Without ever allowing their eyes to meet they exchanged inconsequent small talk while the long procession of courses was served to them. At length Ilona caught the Duchess’s eye; they rose together and the ladies left the table. Soon after, the Duke excused himself to receive his guests who were driving over from houses in the neighbourhood. At half past ten the band struck up and the dance began.

  Franz Ferdinand opened it with Ilona, then De Richleau led out the Duchess, and the rest joined in. By right of his position as host the Duke had the next dance with Ilona, and he had arranged for it to be the ‘Blue Danube’ waltz.

  As she melted into his arms and they whirled gracefully away, he whispered. “At last! At last! Until I heard last night that you were coming after all, I near died of misery.”

  “And I,” she whispered back. “Just think what it meant, having to perform public duties yesterday and to-day instead of being here for our party. I could kill that woman.”

  “Forget her,” he smiled. “You are here now, and that is all that matters. For the flower you sent me, I kiss your hands; and when it is dead I mean to keep it in a jewelled casket as long as I live.”

  The high notes of the waltz seemed to lift them with every turn, as though they were revolving above a sea of fleecy clouds. Now that he held her again, he was so intoxicated by her nearness that he could think of nothing more to say. She, too, remained silent, her eyes wide and brilliant as she swayed to the lilt of the music. In perfect accord they spun as though one being in circle after circle round the floor; and it was only at the end of the dance that he got back his wits sufficiently to mutter:

  “May I, to-night, dance with you again?”

  “Yes,” she breathed. “As my host, you may.”

  “And now,” he said quickly, “can we go out on to the terrace, or must we remain here?”

  “You may take me out for a minute—just for a breath of air.”

  With her hand on his arm he led her to the open french windows, but there they halted in dismay: it had begun to rain again and was coming down quite heavily.

  For five minutes they stood there, but other couples were so near them that they could only exchange platitudes. Then, when the band struck up again, she gave him a pathetic little smile and beckoned to Adam Grünne to come and dance with her.

  De Richleau took advantage of his position to dance twice more with the Chotek, so that comment should not be aroused when he danced with Ilona a second time. But it was after supper before she asked him to have the band play the ‘Count of Luxembourg’ waltz and dance it with her.

  This time he had all his wits about him. When they were well out on the floor he told her about the alcove in her bedroom, and how to slide the partition back so that the door it concealed would be revealed and could be opened.

  She stiffened in his arms and turned her blue eyes up to his in a frightened glance.

  “You do not mean—” she whispered. “You—you cannot mean —”

  He smiled down at her. “Princess, I am De Richleau, Duke and Hereditary Peer of France, Lieutenant-General, Count von Königstein, and Knight of the Golden Fleece. Unless tradition lies, it would not be the first time that one of my line has been received by a beautiful Habsburg in her bedroom. But you are unmarried, and I love you too much to ask more than that you should leave your room to meet me for a few minutes on the balcony that lies outside the hidden door.”

  Ilona closed her eyes and her breath came in a little gasp as she murmured: “I am feeling faint. Take me somewhere where I can sit down.”

  Obediently he led her out of the ballroom, to the almost deserted buffet and, having settled her in an elbow chair, brought her a glass of champagne.

  After a few sips she looked up at him. Her face was very white but her voice steady as she said: “Very well. We have missed so much to-day and yesterday, and our opportunities of being together are so few that I will grant what you ask. At what hour do you wish me to meet you?”

  His grey eyes held hers. “It is after two already. I shall stop the band at three o’clock. Give me half an hour to get rid of our guests. I will be outside the door at half past three.”

  She nodded. The band had stopped. When she had finished her champagne, he took her back to the ballroom. For a few minutes they talked to Count Harrach, then as the music began again she asked the Count to dance with her.

  At a quarter to three De Richleau prepared to end the party with ruthless efficiency. He had the band play a gallop as a prelude to the finale and ordered them to play the National Anthem at three o’clock precisely. Then he sent servants out to warn the coachmen and chauffeurs to be ready to take the departing guests home, told others to have their wraps ready in the great hall, and his steward to have half the candles put out as soon as the Archduke had retired.

  No one except Ilona guessed how well affairs had been stage-managed, as the dance seemed to end perfectly naturally. But by twenty past three no one, except the servants who were clearing up, remained downstairs. When De Richleau had seen off his last guests he gave a quick look round and slipped out on to the terrace.

  To his acute distress he found that the spatter of rain had now increased to a steady downpour. Up on that little balcony outside Ilona’s room there was not an inch of cover for them; yet it was his fixed determination in no circumstances to enter her apartments. He had hoped for half an hour with her. That was to have been for him the high spot of all that had gone before. He had parted with £2,400, and been to infinite pains to achieve this stolen meeting; yet now the accursed weather must reduce it to a few moments and a mere good-night.

  With quick light steps he ran through the sheeting rain, along the terrace and up the spiral steps that led to the balcony. He felt certain that she would not disappoint him, but all the joyous anticipation he would normally have felt was turned by the wet to bitter frustration. With his back against the stone wall he waited.

  He had been there no more than five minutes when a crack of light appeared and the door swung open revealing Ilona. She was still in her ball dress of filmy white, but now wore over it a long cloak with a hood which almost concealed it. Stepping quickly out into the rain, she pulled the door to behind her.

  “Princess,” he murmured sadly. “We have had the most devilish hick. Even the weather is against us. I dare not detain you for more than a moment or you will be soaked to the skin.”

  She smiled at him. “Have you forgotten that I like the rain. I don’t mind a bit about getting wet.”

  Trembling a little, he took a step forward and held out his hands; but she did not take them. Instead, she raised her arms and flung them round his neck.

  Her soft lips were warm, moist and passionate, as she pressed them against his and clung to him with all her strength. Then, throwing back her head and gazing up into his eyes, she cried:

  “Oh, Armand! Armand! I love you! I love you terribly. So much that I could die of it.

  CHAPTER XIV – AN ILL TIMED HONOUR

  It was the afternoon following the dance. All the guests had left that morning, so De Richleau was now alone in the castle except for his servants. The sun was shining again and he stood once more on the little balcony where, twelve hours before, he had held Ilona in his arms. Like some poor couple in the back streets of a city, who had nowhere else to go, they had remained there, clinging together in an angle of the wall, while the rain trickled down their faces on to their sodden garments until they had gradually become soaked through. It now seemed to the Duke as if hardly twenty minutes had elapsed between his going up to the balcony in a sad state of dejection and coming down from it as though he were treading on air: but, in fact, nearly two hours had passed, for Ilona had not left him until the full light of the summer dawn had made it dangerous for her to linger there any longer.

  He could remember
practically nothing that either of them had said. Oblivious of their bedraggled state, they had not once relaxed their embrace, but gone on kissing, and kissing and kissing; with breath enough left between whiles only to murmur those sweet endearments that lovers have used through all the ages. He realized now that Ilona’s sudden surrender must have been brought about by the same feelings that had harassed him so terribly during the past few days. Her disappointment had equalled his at the Chotek’s unintentional ruining of their plan for spending two days together, and she had been through the additional ordeal of having to appear happy at public functions when she had hoped to be at Königstein. No doubt she had not even visualized what might occur between them there, but frustration had so preyed upon her mind that when, after all, fate had permitted the longed-for meeting the strength of her emotions had broken down all barriers.

  They had made no plans: there were none they could make. He would see her the following night, at her birthday ball; but after that when, if ever, they would meet again lay on the knees of the gods. To-day was Friday, June the 12th, and on Monday night he must leave Vienna for Belgrade. He had meant to break the news of his coming departure to her during her visit to Königstein, but that had been so curtailed that he had not had the heart to do so during dinner or the dance, and later it had been out of the question. Now it was going to be harder than ever. He could not possibly tell her the truth and, within a few days of her having declared her love for him, to say that any matter of business necessitated his leaving her would appear unbelievably callous. Trained as she was to put duty before all else, he felt that he could best soften the blow by saying that he had been summoned to Constantinople to clear up certain questions in connection with the Turkish military appointment he had held, and promise to be back as soon as he possibly could.

  But would he be able to get back once he had taken up his duties as a Lieutenant-General in the Serbian Army? If he could succeed in foiling Dimitriyevitch’s plans for provoking a war, all might yet be well. If not, the probability was that he would be caught in Serbia when the war opened. He could, of course, desert and, since he was entering the Serbian Army only as the secret agent of Britain, he felt no scruples at the thought of doing so. But by that time, if he made his way back to Vienna, what would be his position there? The odds were that all Europe would by then be in flames and he, as an Englishman, be ranged among Austria’s enemies.

  It was difficult, almost impossible, to realize that perhaps in as little as ten days, if Dimitriyevitch’s evil coup succeeded, the fighting would have started and he, De Richleau, be an enemy of the country which meant so much to him. When he was exiled from France it had been a toss-up whether he became an Austrian or an Englishman. He had a title and this fine estate in Austria, and not even a permanent home in England. He loved the Austrians, too, for their gaiety, culture and graceful way of life. Yet he had become an Englishman because he believed that on the British had fallen the spiritual mantle of Imperial Rome. The two Empires had been built on the same traditions of justice, tolerance, and freedom for all their peoples, irrespective of race or creed; and he believed in these things.

  Only a dozen years earlier France had expelled the Chartreuse Fathers and seized their property. In Russia politicals were still sent without trial to Siberia and Jews knouted to death. Germany regimented her whole people. Italy was a sink of corruption. Austria repressed her Serbs and Croats; Hungary her Rumanians. The British alone seemed to possess the secret of gaining strength through liberty, and by a steady, ordered progress uniting the 500,000,000 people over whom they ruled by common interests that made for the prosperity and security of them all. Their example had already done an incalculable amount to influence other nations in the same direction, so it had seemed a sane and reasonable hope that within a few more generations tyranny and oppression would be expurgated from the world. De Richleau had thought that he might live to see that, but now, if Britain were to be drawn into a conflict against the Central Empires, and her championship of individual liberty jeopardized, then, for the very reason he had become a British citizen he must, if need be, spill Austrian blood.

  With a sigh he descended to the terrace and began to make his own preparations for returning to Vienna. He cast a last look round the gracious rooms, wondering how they would look if, and when, he saw them again. It did not even enter his mind that the castle might be sequestered and his property stolen or damaged by the Austrians. They were much too civilized and chivalrous to indulge in petty spite against an individual because he happened to be fighting on the other side; but if the Russians invaded they were quite capable of looting it; or it might be partially destroyed through some hazard of war. He made a mental note to write later on to his second cousin, the Grand Duke Nicholas, and request that, in the event of the Russian armies approaching Königstein, special steps should be taken to protect the people on has estate from brutal treatment, and his property from pilfering. Then having once more thanked his steward and left a considerable sum of money to be distributed among the servants, he set off for the capital.

  Next morning, when he awoke in his bedroom at Sacher’s, his mind began to revolve round the sort of present he could give Ilona for her birthday. It had to be something small, which could be pressed into her hand when they danced together that night, as it was contrary to etiquette for royalty to accept personal presents from anyone outside their own families. On the contrary, it was their practice to give presents to others in the form of honours, decorations and pensions. Of this De Richleau was soon to have embarrassing evidence.

  The whistle in the stopper of the speaking tube beside his bed piped gently and, when he answered it, the hall porter informed him that Captain Count Adam Grünne was below, asking to see him urgently.

  It was not yet half past seven, but De Richleau asked that his visitor should be sent up. Then, getting out of bed, he put on a dressing-gown and went into the sitting-room to receive him.

  The dapper Count Adam was as spick and span as ever, but he did not return the Duke’s cheerful greeting. Instead, he bowed formally and, holding out a thick envelope eighteen inches wide by a foot deep, said:

  “I pray your Excellency to excuse the unusual hour of my visit, but I was commanded by Her Imperial Highness to give you this without delay.”

  Returning his formal bow, De Richleau broke the seals of the huge crested envelope and took out the parchment it contained. Under the Imperial arms the following was set out in copperplate:

  “By these presents I, Ilona Theresa” etc. etc., “do hereby commission and appoint my good and loyal servant Count Königstein,” etc. etc., “to hold the honorary rank of Colonel in my own Regiment of Hussars.”

  “Good God!” exclaimed the Duke.

  “There is more to it,” said Count Adam grimly. “I am further commanded by Her Imperial Highness to order you to have the dress uniform of this rank in her regiment made to-day, and to appear in it to-night at her birthday ball.”

  “But this is absolute madness! It must be stopped at once.”

  Adam Grünne abandoned his formal attitude and made a grimace as he sat himself down on the arm of the sofa. “My friend, I wish to Heaven it could be; but it is too late. The appointment was made yesterday and will appear in this morning’s Gazette. All Vienna that has an interest in such matters will read of it over their coffee and rolls within the next few hours.”

  “Could you not prevent her committing this folly?”

  “I knew nothing of it till half an hour ago, when I reported for duty and Sárolta brought me out the commission and message for you.”

  De Richleau stared at the document and, seeing Ilona’s rounded scrawl against the red, beribboned seal at its foot, said quickly; “Surely all commissions in the Imperial Army must be signed by the Emperor and the Gazette will not publish anything that has not first received his approval?”

  “In this case it is unnecessary. The Archduchess has an absolute right to give anyone she likes
a commission in her own regiment.”

  “Then we are in the very devil of a mess.”

  “I fear you are. To-night all eyes will be riveted on you and her; and I shall be surprised if you do not receive an order to quit Vienna as soon as it can be conveyed to you without giving additional point to this excellent basis for starting a scandal.”

  The Duke gave a rather twisted smile. He had to leave Vienna in any case on Monday. It seemed mean to take advantage of Ilona’s generosity as an excuse for doing so; yet it would make her less unhappy to think that he had left in order to protect her from the results of her own rashness, rather than for any other reason: so he said:

  “Then I shall forestall any such unpleasantness by leaving of my own free will.”

  “You could hardly do better as far as saving her name is concerned,” Adam Grünne agreed with a friendly smile of appreciation. “But not until to-morrow or Monday. You must appear to-night to kiss hands on your appointment and ask leave of absence; otherwise your going will look like an insult and cause more tongues to wag than ever.”

  De Richleau was very glad that the stalwart little Count viewed matters so. Only to save Ilona from open disgrace could he have brought himself to leave Vienna without saying good-bye to her; and Grünne’s opinion tallied with his own. Refolding the parchment that she had so impetuously ordered to be made out in a natural but ill-considered wish to do public honour to her lover, he observed:

  “Your prediction has come true only too soon, Count. But I trust you do not think too ill of me for not having taken your advice to leave Vienna ten days ago.”

  “In the circumstances you would hardly have been human if you had. Still, it is to be regretted for both your sakes that the affair should have gone so far. What occurred between you at the dance on Thursday night is no business of mine: but she was in the deuce of a state all yesterday. She couldn’t sit still for two minutes, and coughed herself sick with excitement. Last night she was running a temperature again, and Sárolta says that if her doctor saw her he would not allow her to get up to-day. But, of course, she has forbidden anyone to send for him, and wild horses won’t prevent her appearing at the ball to-night.”