PRINCE RODERICK.

Evening Star, Issue 8084, 7 December 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

PRINCE RODERICK.

Br James Beinslky-Richakds, Author of 'Seven Years at Eton,' 'Tho Duko's Marriage,' otc. CHAPTER XVI. No soore." had His Serena Highness, the reigning Granil-duko of VVeniggeld, signified his gracious intention of visiting Prince Roderick and Princess Dorothea, than their Royal Highnesses Prince Wolfgang of Kronheim and his wife tho Princess Ursula, King Franz's daughter, formed a similar purpose. There waa consequently a grand sweeping up and down of the palaeo. Armies of housemaids went about with mops and , clean bedroom curtains. I was rclegatod to an attic, tor all the best apartments in tho j palaco were wanted for the Royal and Sercno ( guests and their suites. PrinceFs Dot discovered that sho had nothing fit to wear, nnd started for Sabelburg with her ladies to meet a dressmaker who had been telegraphed for from Paris, and who was ordered to prepare a. trifle of twenty-four costumes to be ready within ten days. I Prince visit was a surprise. { Whether it was that Prince Roderick's outburst of plain»speakiug in the King's prcscuco had frightened tho Court; or whether it was that Prince Wolfgang wished to dissociato himself ostensibly from tho intrigues which were being j carried on in his inter st { or whether again tho Court had decided to show the world that affectionate family endeavors were being made to reclaim. Prince Roderick ; certain it is that thfe utmost publicity was given to Prince Wolfgang's visit. Princo Roderick was evidently gratified, und resolved to receive his guests in the most hospitable style. Tho entire household of tho winter palace wero summoned from the capital with their gala liveries. Footmen began to swarm around, and the kitchen regions resounded like a monkeyhouse with the chattering of French cooks. A pyrotechnician also came down to arrange for a Venetian night/tfo With illuminations and firework?. On one point, however, Prince Roderick was inexorable—he would not allow a military uniform to bo worn during the visits. This matter had to be settled by chamberlains, and formed the theme for a regular negotiation not exempt from difficulties. To mo the prince frankly explained his ideas. " Clergymen and lawyers don't parade about in their gowns, and schoolmasters don't wear canes strapped to their waists. I think it's absurd for gentlemen to dress themselves up with carving knive3 as if they were always going to kill somebody. Besides, tbeso uniforms .",re fatal to conversation. The man with two stars on his collar daren't argue with the man who has three stars, and the man with the threo stars is down on all fours before the man with the gold or silver collar. As for the man with the gold collar, he doesn't converse ; he simply pontifics, emits oracles, and makes your jaws ache from trying to stop yawns." Those, however, who know how utterly unclassified a German officer of rank feels < whou he has to put himself into civilian ' garb will understand what a remarkable ] appearance our visitors presented on the first day of their muster. Such a collec- : tion of bell-mouthed pantaloons and creased frockaoats would have brought all the cut- 1 tors in Savile Row on to the pavement to j stare. Every man seemed tc have cased himself in a brand new shirt ono dze too 1 small at the coilr.r, and had smothered hi a 1 hands in dogskins a size too large. Left hands fumbled mechanically at the hips i for missing sword-hilts ; and silk hats, 1 treated like helmets, in being carried under 1 the arm, resented this usage by bridling : ttp in the nap. When evening dress was 1 put on the spectacle was co less astonish- < ing. Every shirt fronu bulged, or had 1 kinks, or showed s:gn3 of a struggle at the ( buttonholes, where big studs had been i jammed through by main force; and the ; bow of almost every white tie was writh- j ing up towards the wearer's left ear. 1 The Grand-duke Kothbart was especially 1 Vme of those men who are best contemplated ' in uniform. He was a little imp of a potentate about live feet four in height, with 1 a fierce carroty moustache, and hair clipped 1 short and standing upright over his bullet < head like a gooseberry'.". His face was 1 purple, and his Voice cracked from bawling j commands to his soldier?. He strutted like j i a Dorking cock, but when seen in a tight. 1 tunic, long ypurs, and a cocked hat, may i have cut an imposing figure. Hia Serene "Highness had the tactkal i genius of Marshall Von Moltke, as he could j prove by a letter in the marshal's own i hand. Once he had sent the marshal the 1 plan of a battle, and had received the com- i plimentary reply that it was the identical < plan of the battle of Sedan. Grand-duke Kothbart was a boy when Sedan was fought, i so it became manifest that the plan which 1 he had worked out by his own inspiration ; would have enabled him to win the battle i had he commanded in chief. Ho was now < for pulverising the French. The army of . Weniggeld, which for;ned two battalions and a squadron of the united German forces, i was in the highest state of efficiency, and i always ready to march upon France at three days notice. Prince Wolfgang was a tall and grave young man, with a large family and not too much money. King Franz wa3 rich, but indulged his daughter sparingly with supplies, having a not unfounded idea that if princes are to work they must be kept on short commons. Princo Wolfgang had , taken to soldiering as the only pursuit compatible with his mean?, and he was really a good officer. His recreation was to study surgery, and his ambition was to qualify a-; aii army surgeon. But this was a secret. He was now practising operations in private, and his friends hoped that Borne day he would set the seal to his popularity by cutting off a leg publicly in a hospital amphitheatre, and tacking the title ot "Doctor" for ever moic to his other dignities. His wife, the Princess Ursula, was a fat and fair lady, who was born with a good temper and some common sense, but had got spoilt by a raging detestation for her cousins, Roderick and Dorothea. Sho hated them for their money and for Roderick's priority to her in the line of succession. Being the King's i daughter, sho thought she had a right to succeed to the throne, and had solicited opinions favorable to her claims in the abstract from the Queens of England, Spain, and Madagascar. Armed with these, she i had asked Prince Bismarck point blank whether he could not prevail on the Bundenralfi (Council of the Empire) to abrogate tho ungallant Salic Law of Kronheim. Foiled in thia by the Chancellor's heavy *' Nein," the Princess Ursula had taken refuge in " German patriotism," and set herself to do the exact opposite of everything that her cousins did. They adopted French dresses,! wines, and foreign servants; she would havo none of these things. Sho despised the French as the inventors of fantastic soup". She would not wear, eat, i or drink anything French if sho knew it. Her dresses wore mado by Germans out of German stuffs; she gavo her guests beer, Rhine wine 3, and native stews, which wore described oa tho " bills of fare " by their proper German names. Such a thing as a menu never entered her house. For all this the Princess Ursula wa3 much liked by tho impoverished aristocracy and the middle classes of Kronheim, who held that she sot a truly noble example of decent, economical, and dignified living. Mothers blessed her , for inviting their girls to appear at her dances in plain white muslin and thread j gloves ; and it must be owned that her | outspoken partiality for officers who lived , on their pay and supped off cold sausage hid done not a little towaids raising the moral standard of tho Kronheim army. Unfortunately the princess's digestion having suffered somewhat from her patriotic diet, she presented to me, when I saw her waddle besido Princess Dot, the appearance of a rather uncomfortable Gorman dame with a reddening nose. I was quite lost in the throng of equerries and aides-de-camp who attended upon the princes, and I saw from the outset that there would bo little chance of my getting a private word -with my affianced bride so long as the visits lasted. The prinoely party and their ladies dined in a room by

themselves, Tbe suites had their table in an adjoining apartment, and I took the bottom scut. Sonncnthal had returned on duty, and we were by no means a dull assemblage; but after dinner, etiquette obliged us to remain standing all the evening. "Sit down when you can," was the advico once given by an old courtier to a young one who had asked for some maxims of conduct at Court.

I was presented to the Grand - duko Rothbart on the terrace during coffee. There was a broad yellow riband over lila waistcoat. Holding his coffee-cup and sucking a fat cigar, he looked up at mo as at a lamp-post. " You have been an English oflicer ? The English havo no army. They have good soldiers, but that is not enough."

I bowed. " Give mo a hundred thousand men and I would land on any part of tho English coast," continued His Serene Highness. " I would march straight upon London, and there would be no resistance. But happily wo arc allies."

"I trust England and Weniggcld may always remain friends, sir," was my answer. Prince Wolfgang came up to me and asked some sensible questions about our English method of recruiting cavalry, then lapsed into his favorito topic of surgery and discussed wounds. Jlc had the German way of contradicting you flat when he disagreed, but otherwise he was a pattern of good manners'. His wife, the Princess Ursula, inquired who I was, and then eyed me askance. I overheard her remark to a general that the English army only fought negroes, and that British cavalry oiKcers went into action with bottles of sodawater aud brandy in their holsters.

I suspect that the Princess Ursula must have heard en the very evening of her arrival, through maid-servants, that there was something between me and the Princess Dot, for she scrutinised me more closely than was required, and fixed a keen eye on all the princess's movements. The Grand-duke Rothbart had drawn his chair close to Princess Dot's, and was paying his court to her by saying how he would smash up the French whenever ho met them. She listened with the greatest affectation of interest, clasping her jewelled hands, giggling and sighing. At last when the time came for tho ladies to retire she held out her hand to the Grandduke, who embraced ii-, after which she danced up to Princess Ursula in a girlMi sort of way, and whispered something which made tho elder princess endeavor to look amiable and congratulatory. All this was nothing to me, for I should as soon have condescended to be jealous of a jackanapes us of Grand-duke Rothbart. Besides, I had plenty to do in providing amusements for the prince'u guests. We were in August, and the shooting season had begun. Since Tristan's death tho head gamekeepor took his orders from me ; and by the prince's desire I undertook to make up the shooting parties. CHAPTER XVII. We shot over the bills and woods on the further shore of the lake. Our keepers, beaters, aud loaders formed quite a host, and the game was abundant. Hares were especially plentiful. A common " bag" for twenty guns would comprise 500 hares, 800 partridges and pheasant*, and a of roebuck, besides a number of owls, kites, foxes, and polecats. I had to assign the places, and always kept near Prince Roderick, taking what game came to me with the rest. The prince was no more than a fair shot, and I had to finiih off a good many hares and birds which he had merely winged. Prince Wolfgang rarely missed. I saw him knock over three hares which had started up together—the first brace rolling over before his two barrels, and the tkird being hit, at a long ihot, by the second gun, which he took from his loader's hande. The Grandduke of Weniggeld was a poor performer; but ho had an invariable joke, which consisted in exclaiming when he got an unmissable shot: "It tiiat fellow were only •a Frenchman !—bang, bang ! you see he's got it." His Serene Highness always gave the supposed Frenchman the benefit of both barrels, and most of his birds were picked up in a state, of hash. We lunched under the trees, where tables were spread for us, or in one of the many .shooting lodges—pretty houses with broad verandahs and antlcrec! stags' heads decorating all tho walls. The ladic3 joined us at lunch, aud Princess Ursula always testified her contempt, so far as good breeding would allow, at the profusion of cold viands and French wines.

"No thank you, give mo scmo mutton stew, please," sho would say, rejecting g.kutine and raised pies. There was always some hot dish prepared by a keeper's wife, and on this the princess fed, adding slabs of Emmcnthaler cheese and draughts of Bavarian beer. Tho Grand-duke Rothbart did not disdain Gallic ■pitks and Burgundy, but as he thought Burgundy aud Champagne were provinces which ought to belong to Germany, and would bo conquered by him some day, he flattered himself that ho was only enjoying his own by drinking their wine?. Through a piece of customary sycophancy, at which I connived, the head keeper always creamed off a large percentage of my "bag" and added it to the Grand-duke's, so that His Serene Highness might be able to cock his head at tablo when tho scores wore read out. In this he never failed, and the Princess Dot would chirp admiringly : " How beautifully your Highness shoots ! What sang-froid it must require to kill one of those ugly foxes when he comes along, gnashing hie teeth. Oh, I know I should run away and throw down my gun for him to bite."

Tho use of French terms plagued the Princess Ursula extremely, so that one day she inquired, with a forced smile: "Is there no German word for sang-froid, dearest Dorothea ?''

"I daresay there fa, dearest Ursula," answered her cousin ; " but I am so ilourdk. I sometimes forget the German for partridge from always meeting with the bird as perdrix avx choux." " The mission of Franco is to cook for Germany," interposed Grand duke Rothbart sententiously. " Give mo my own people to cook for me," retorted the Princess Ursula indignantly, mashing a potato with her fork. " I have read that during the siege of Paris some French cooka dressed dogs so as to taste liko veal. Now I think that only proves tho natural dcceitfulness of the people. I trust no German will ever debase himself to make a dog tasto otherwise than as dog." "During the siego even the tough old foxes of tho Zoological Gardens must have tasted like ambrosia," opined the Grandduke, whom Burgunc'y was makingdecidedly clever at repartee. Half a dozen shooting excursions had passed off without any incident when the day for the Venetian night fete arrived. It was to be a J(He indoors and out; tho island to be lit up alyiorno, and everybody to wear masks and dominoes. For this entertainment a great many guests were invited from tho capital, aud came down in a special train ; among them Harold Crowo and Sir George Malmsey, who was attended by a second Secretary of the Legation, Mr Mildmay Milkinson.

Sir George was anxious to ascertain from me how things were going on at the palace. " Confoundedly queer place, eh ! what ? Money chucked out in shovelfuls, I suppose. No news of tho murderer yet' Coming down in the train I bet Milkinson a guinea to a baked applo that this marriago between the Grand-duko and tho Princess Dorothea would never como off. You see if Milkinson don't have to pay me my baked apple." Mr Milkinson was one of those young diplomatists who, having lived abroad sinco his moustaches began growing, had ceased to belong to his native land without having got acclimatised elsewhere. When ho went home ou leave ho always prophosied the early annihilation of England by coalitions of foreign fleets, and was shocked to find his warnings received with unbecoming levity. Ho could speak no German, and thought it a hardship to be paid for living in a German country (the Foreign Office had not yot discovered a country which exactly pleased him). Mr Milkinson attempted to be affable with all conditions of men; but his life was not without its severe trials, for English merchants, inventors, widows, orphans, and people of that kind kept bringing com-

plaints to the Legation, and obliging him to write letters—"All of which is Consular business, you know," as ho feelingly explained in recounting his tribulations. "It's desperate hard lines that you can't get Englishmen to understand what a Legation is."

Harold Crowe felt an unkind antipathy to Mr Milkiuson, and was for playing some practical jokes on him, but I gavo a more useful direction to his energies by getting him to help me in the preparations for tlie night/e/e—all tho administrative business of which fell to inc.

Tho palace was now over full, and we I had to billot guests for the night in the park lodges, at the Swan Inu, and in some of the villas of the valley. An enormous couEi.'nment of masks, dominoes, and black wide-awakes had been sent from Sabelburg, and a vestiary had to be organised where the visitors could go and choose what fitted tliein. Refreshment tents wcrb meanwhile being erected in the park, and innkeepers from the neighborhood assembled to take charge of them. Thus Andreas Reidl came with his daughter Lisbeth, and Frida Suss, the pretty goose-girl, to assist. Tho launch was steaming to and fro from the shore all the morning, and bringing so many unknown faces to the island thatldid not like it at all. I knew, however, that this Venetian file, had been planned on purpose that tho Princess Dot might have an hour's unrestrained intercourse with me. In the only five minutes of privacy which she was able to snatch for me during ten days, she had told mo that she would insist upon everybody's being masked from nine o'clock till supper at midnight, and that she herself would meet me under a certain tree at ten o'clock, wearing a domino with cherrycolored streamers on both shoulders. "Then we will have a talk, my Ferdinand," she added, letting me take both her hands, " for I love you as much as ever—no, a thousand times more than ever."

the pretty goose-girl, to assist. Tho launch was steaming to and fro from the shore all the morning, and bringing so many unknown faces to the island thatldid not like it at all. I knew, however, that this Venetian file, had been planned on purpose that tho Princess Dot might have an hour's unrestrained intercourse with me. In the only five minutes of privacy which she was able to snatch for me during ten days, she bad told mo that she would insist upon everybody's being masked from nine o'clock till supper at midnight, and that sho herself would meet me under a certain tree at ten o'clock, wearing a domino with cherrycolored streamers on both shoulders. "Then we will have a talk, my Ferdinand," she added, letting me take both her hands, " for I love you as much as ever—no, a thousand times more than ever." It was reassuring to hear that my charmer's affection was undiminished, though I have already confessed that I was not modest enough to fear tho Grandduke Rothbart as a rival; but on tho other hand, I could not help fearing that there might be danger to Prince Roderick in a'l this masking. With so many strange people about, what could be more easy than for an assassin to approach him? It accmed lidiculous to take such minute precautions as wo did every day, and to throw these all overboard for a whole evening. A discovery which I made a few hours before tho masque began added considerably to my apprehensions. I was now in charge of the gun room, and, thinking I would make all safe in that quarter, I went to remove the ammunition and look to the fastenings of the doors. As I was taking a survey of the racks, my eye fell upon ttie swan-shot gun with which Tristan had been killed. The place where it used te stand had remained vacant since Tristan's death ; but now tho gun had been restored to its old_ position. There was no mistaking it, for it bore a number, and I knew that number by heart. If some power could endow inanimate objects with the faculty of speaking but for a moment! I handled the gun, scrutinising every part of it for a chance testimony which might convict its late possessor. It had been cleaned since last used—the breech was well oiled, and the interier of the barrel sparkled like glas3. Whoever had last shot with it, the man was a cool hand. Only the prince and I ought to have had keys of the gun room, but a third key might exist for all I knew, or somebody might have abstracted the prince's key. The door lock had not been tampered with, but it was a common lock which many keys not made for it might lit. Tantalising to madness was it to reflect that the gun must have beca replaced on that very day, and that Ihe murderer was possibly moving about the grounds now, ohcckling at his absolute immunity from suspicion. I was certain that, the gun had not been in the rack the day before. Of course I sought tho prince at once. I found him half-seated on the parapet of a terrace, ono leg dangling and a cane swinging in his band, as he talked alone with Prince Wolfgang. I expected ho would hear mo in private, but apparently be did not wish his cousin to suspect that there were secrets between us, for he told me to speak out. He turned pale aa I delivered my communication, but afterwards exhibited more annoyance than alarm. Ho had been in a happy mood for some days, and the conversation whieh I had juat interrupted with Prince Wolfgang was evidently interesting to him. The gloomy recollections of Triatan'a death now cropping up again suddenly dashed his spirits. " What can I do?" he said fretfully. "You ought to have had a pateni lock put on the door of the gun room." "There is one thing which ought to bo done without delay," said Prince Wolfgang, with military precision. "Order that no one shall leave tho island. Summon everybody, guests and sorvauts, explain what has happened, and ask if anyone was seen to enter or leave the gun room to-day. Out of the crowd may come a witness." The suggestion was not bad, but Prince Roderick rejected it. " No, it would spoil the night fete," ho said. " There is one consolation in this, that as the murderer has put the gun back he does not mean to shoot me with it." " Shall you wear a mask to-night?'' asked Prince Wolfgang. " Yes ; we shall all be masked, and the men will wear wide-awakes of the same pattern, to that I shall be safer in the crowd than I ever was in my life." "I think you ought to havo some means of communicating with your guards, sir," I said ; " a whistle, for instance, which would bring me to any particular spot when I heard it." " Certainly," interposed Prince Wolfgang. " Very well then, I'll take my dogwhistle," agreed Prince Roderick indifferently ; and we settled that if ho sounded three sharp signals, Sonncnthal and I wero to hurry forthwith to a certain summerhouse. He did not propose that Stolz should be let into the secret, nor did I; but I intended that Harold Crowe should bo. There was a lot of dog whistles in the gun room. I took four, and, giving ono apiece to Sonncnthal and Harold, for a second signal—ono long tremolo whistle—which might at any moment bring us three together. In my mania for precautions I confided the fourth whistle to Joe Trotman, ordered him to mask, and to keep an eye on the Greeks and Montenegrins, particularly on Bojo Klcphtovitch. The private signal between Joe and me was to be a bar of a cavalry trumpet call, which could be easily imitated on the whistle. I still had an unshakable suspicion of Bojo Klcphtovitch, "whoso alternations of surliness and obsequiousness towards me rendered him loathsome. I had got him into good discipline, but he was like an ill-trained hyena, always ready to snap. At evening, when all tho preparations were complete and the guests were dressing for dinner, I went for a last round of inspection. The Greek sailors were picturesquely clustered on the steps of the landing-stage in clean blue-striped shirts, white trousers, and red bonnets. The Montenegrins, who were to act as sentries, had donned their smartest gold-embroidered jackets, lambs'wool bonnets, and Bcarlet sashes. They wero not allowed to carry arms. Bojo alone had an arsenal of silver • mounted flint-lock pistols, and yataghans at his waist. "You know the prince's order about arms, Bojo," I said. "Tho sentries are only to carry sticks and horns." "I thought that on a gala day liko this, sir " protested Bojo sulkily. " No, you must put aside your arms." Bojo, whose blood purpled under his dark skin, made as though he would tear the whole arsenal from his belt and dash it to the ground ; but ho thought better of it, and became abruptly cplm. I pretended to take no notice of his ill-temper. " You didn't see anybody enter or leave the gun room to-day, Bojo ?" I inquired, with a searching look, as soon as he was collected. " Yes, sir, I saw you go in this afternoon - carrying a gun," waß the prompt answer. " Carrying a gun ? What do you mean ? I only had a stick." "Hadn't you, sir? I can't say, for I wasn't spying. I only saw you as I passed, but I could have sworn you were holding a gun."

I tried to remember whether I had oome to tho door of the gun room fowling-piece in hand, and it occurred to me that I had ; but liking the fellow's manner less and less I said: "The gnu with which Tristan was shot has been replaced iu the gun room." " You know the gun then, sir ?" " We have only suspicions ; but in any case a certain gun which was stolen from the armory has been replaced, and 20,000 marks would be paid to any one who told us who had replaced it." "You would pay that money, sir?" asked Bojo with an uumistakablo Bnccr. " Not I, but the prince." "Aye; I thought the offer didn't come from you, sir." " What do you mean, man ?'' " I meant nothing, sir, but that I thought that the money wouldn't come from ; and you tell me I'm right." Not seeing the fellow's drift, I turned away and went indoors to dinner. (End ov Vol. I.j