A Dash .. .. .. For a Throne Part 5

"You wish to make me your enemy?"

"At least I have no wish to make you my friend," I retorted.

"You will live to repent this bitterly!" he cried, with an oath. "We will have no meddlers here in the path of our purpose," and, still more enraged by the smile which the threat evoked from me, he went hurriedly out of the room.

Truly my years of self-repression had wrought a great change in me. Five years before his hot insolence would have so fired me that I would have made him answer for it on the spot; but now I could hold my anger in check and wait for my revenge. But this little conflict was my first live experience for five years, and the sense of it pleased me.

When the man had left me I had no longer any scruples about going forward with my new character. There was no one to be robbed of a fortune, no one to be supplanted in a coveted position--nothing but an overp.a.w.ned castle to be gained. There was apparently a dangerous intrigue to be faced, and a sweet girl's honor to be saved, and a treacherous villain to be exposed and punished--not the kind of inheritance which many men would covet. But then few men were ever placed in my situation.

I was thinking hard over all this when my two captors came back into the room hurriedly, both very angry. Von Nauheim had seen them after leaving me, and had vented his anger on them. They asked me now excitedly if it was my wish that they should leave the castle immediately after the Prince's funeral. I listened to them very quietly. I had already had pretty strong evidence of the lengths to which their zeal for the family's affairs would induce them to go; and von Nauheim's hostility to them was a powerful recommendation in my eyes.

"I beg you to be calm, gentlemen," I said, "and to bear in mind that I know very little of the position of affairs here. I have understood from you that you were both largely in the late Prince's confidence--indeed, you have given me pretty good proof of that since yesterday. But beyond that I do not know what your relations here have been in the past."

"We have been for years in the Prince's confidential service; I myself enjoyed his closest confidence," answered Captain von Krugen. "But my allegiance is to the head of the house. I recognize no one else."

"And you desire to remain in that service?"

"I have no other wish in life, sir," he replied earnestly.

"Nor I," a.s.sented the other.

"If you were in his confidence, you will know that the late Prince has left to his successor no means of maintaining a large retinue."

"What I am and all that I have I owe to your late uncle," said the captain in the same earnest tone. "I ask nothing else than to place my sword and my fortune alike at your disposal. And I can speak for Steinitz here. Our liberty and lives are indeed at issue in the present crisis; and if all is not to fail ignominiously now, we must have a strong hand and a clear head in command."

There was no mistaking the man's sincerity, and, usurper though I was, the offer touched me.

"I believe you absolutely, Captain von Krugen, and you, Herr Steinitz,"

and I gave them my hand. "But, all the same, I do not know what crisis you mean. Tell me freely."

"I tried to tell you on the journey here, but you prevented me. Do you know the history of your family--the lineage on the side of the late Prince's wife?"

"I know very little. Speak as freely as if I knew nothing. You will not try my patience."

"Steinitz, see that there is no one about; and keep guard outside the door that no one enters."

He paused while the younger man withdrew, and then, leading me to a deep window-seat at the end of the room, began to speak in a low tone:

"There is a traitor somewhere among us, and thus the greatest need for caution. For a long time previous to his death your uncle was engaged in a task that involved the highest issues of State. The extreme discontent at the antics of the madman who is now King of Bavaria induced a number of the more prominent and bolder men in the country to plot his overthrow. There is a slip in his ancestry, and the disappearance of a certain Prince Otto, who was the heir to the throne, let in the younger branch of the family, through whom the t.i.tle has descended to the present King. Otto was supposed to have died; but he was only eccentric.

He lived in secret retirement, married, and left a son. From that son, who was unquestionably the rightful heir, the late wife of your uncle came in direct descent. She was the only child of the eldest line, and by right she should have reigned as Queen. As you know, she died, and left the two children--Gustav, who was killed in a duel, and the daughter, who is in the castle at this moment."

"Do you mean----?" I began when he paused.

"I mean that the Countess Minna von Gramberg should at this moment be the Queen of Bavaria; and that by G.o.d's help we shall all live to see her crowned."

His dark face flushed and his eyes glowed with the enthusiasm of this speech.

My own feeling was more wonderment than enthusiasm, however. If this most hazardous and ambitious scheme were afoot, what could be the meaning of von Nauheim's share in it as the betrothed husband of a future queen?

"The Prince's first intention was of course to put his son on the throne, and matters were indeed well ripe for this, when unfortunately he became embroiled in a duel and was killed. That duel we believe to have been forced on him--murder in all but the actual form."

"And the man who killed him?" I asked.

"A noted Italian swordsman, Praga, hired and paid, as we believe, for his work."

"Hired? By whom?"

"By the family who stand next in succession to the throne. The King, as you know, has no children, and the succession pa.s.ses to the Ostenburg branch of the family. That was my master's main hope. Our claims are stronger than theirs; and we had on this account secured the support of most of the prominent men in the country."

"Well?" I asked, for he paused with a gesture of disappointment.

"Count Gustav's death threw everything back. Where they had been ready to stand by a man, some of them drew back, frightened, from supporting a young girl--and, unless a bold stroke be made now, everything may be lost."

"What bold stroke do you mean?"

"Like that planned before. Everything was ready. We thought the Ostenburg agents had not a suspicion of our plans. We had resolved to take advantage of the mad King's fancies to lure him out on one of those wild midnight drives of his, and then to seize his person and put one of ourselves into his place, made up, of course, to resemble him; and to let the dummy play the part of King long enough to enable us to get the madman where he ought to have been long since--into restraint. Then the dummy was to throw aside his disguise and declare that he had been acting by the King's orders; that the latter had abdicated and had proclaimed the Count Gustav his successor, as being the rightful lineal heir. We should have done the rest. It was a brave scheme."

"It was as mad as the King himself," said I. "But what then?"

"It was just before things were ripe that the other side got wind through some treachery somewhere; and the count was killed in the duel."

"Well?"

"Half the cowards drew away. But they will all come back the moment they see us strike a blow; and it was to have you close at hand, helping in the good work, that the Prince sent for you."

"And the Count von Nauheim?"

"The Prince had supreme confidence in him. He was not with us at first; but his coming secured us the help of a very large and influential section of the people--enough to turn the balance, indeed, and make the scheme certain of success. The Prince welcomed him heartily enough, and cheerfully complied with the condition fixed by those for whom he acted--that the Countess Minna should be given to him in marriage."

This made me thoughtful, knowing as I did the man's character.

"And the daughter herself?"

My companion frowned, drawing his dark brows close together, and pursed up his lips, as he replied ambiguously:

"Neither man nor woman at such a time can think of any but reasons of State."

"You mean that she consented to give her hand, but could not give her heart with it."

"I mean more than that, sir, and I must speak frankly to you. The Countess Minna has never favored the scheme, but has strongly opposed it--and opposes it still. Women have no ambition. She has no longing for a throne; and now that her father is dead I fear--well, I do not know what she may do. If you will urge her, she is her father's daughter, and will, I believe, go through with it. But much will depend upon you."

"And if she does not go on with it--what then?"

"We are all pledged too deeply to draw back now, your Highness," he answered, very earnestly. "We must either succeed or fail--there is no middle course; and failure means a prison or a convent for the Prince's daughter, and worse than ruin for the rest of us. As for yourself, you, I warn you, will be the certain object of attack, for there is no safe obscurity here. The enemies of your Highness's house will never rest satisfied while a possible heiress to the throne remains at large, or while those who have helped to put her there are alive and at liberty.

As I told you at Hamnel, we are playing for desperate stakes, and must play boldly and like men."

Before I had time to reply we heard Steinitz in conversation with some one outside the door, and a moment later he opened it, and said that the Countess Minna was anxious to see me, and was coming to the library for that purpose.