The Great Court Scandal

Her enemies were now playing their trump card. They had no doubt bribed those three men to certify what was a direct untruth. A royal sovereign can, alas I command the services of any one; for everybody, more or less, likes to render to royalty a service in the hope of decoration or of substantial reward. Most men are at heart place-seekers. Men who are most honest and upright in their daily lives will not hesitate to perjure themselves, or “stretch a point” as they would doubtless put it, where royalty is concerned.

Gazing out into the brilliant moonlight mirrored upon the smooth surface of the lake, she calmly reviewed the situation.

She was in grave peril – so grave, indeed, that she was now utterly bewildered as to what her next step should be. Once certified as a lunatic and shut up in an asylum somewhere away in the heart of the country, all hope of the future would be cut off. She would be entirely at the mercy of those who so persistently and unscrupulously sought her end. Having failed in their other plot against, her, they intended to consign her to a living tomb.

Yet by good fortune had her curiosity been aroused, and she had overheard sufficient to reveal to her the truth. Her face was now hard, her teeth firmly set. Whatever affection she had borne her husband was crushed within her now that she realised how ingeniously he was conspiring against her, and to what length he was actually prepared to go in order to rid himself of her.

She thought of Ignatia, poor, innocent little Ignatia, the child whom its father had cursed from the very hour of its birth, the royal Princess who one day might be crowned a reigning sovereign. What would become of her? Would her own Imperial family stand by and see their daughter incarcerated in a madhouse when she was as sane as they themselves – more sane, perhaps?

She sat bewildered.

With the Emperor against her, however, she had but little to hope for in that quarter. His Majesty actually believed the scandal that had been circulated concerning Leitolf, and had himself declared to her face that she must be mad.

Was it possible that those hot words of the Emperor’s had been seized upon by her husband to obtain a declaration that she was really insane?

Insane? She laughed bitterly to herself at such a thought.

“Ah!” she sighed sadly, speaking hoarsely to herself. “What I have suffered and endured here in this awful place are surely sufficient to send any woman mad. Yet God has been very good to me, and has allowed me still to preserve all my faculties intact. Why don’t they have some assassin to kill me?” she added desperately. “It would surely be more humane than what they now intend.”

Steinbach, her faithful but secret friend, was on his way to Vienna. She wondered whether, after reading the letter, the Emperor would relent towards her? Surely the whole world could not unite as her enemy. There must be human pity and sympathy in the hearts of some, as there was in the heart of the humble Steinbach.

Not one of the thirty millions over whom she would shortly rule was so unhappy as she that night. Beyond the park shone the myriad lights of the splendid capital, and she wondered whether any one living away there so very far from the world ever guessed how lonely and wretched was her life amid all that gorgeous pomp and regal splendour.

Those three grave, spectacled men who had dined at her table and talked their scientific jargon intended to denounce her. They had been quick to recognise that a future king is a friend not to be despised, while the bankers’ drafts that certain persons had promised them in exchange for their signatures as experts would no doubt be very acceptable.

Calmly she reviewed the situation, and saw that, so clearly had her enemies estranged her from every one, she was without one single friend.

For her child’s sake it was imperative for her to save herself. And she could only save herself by flight. But whither? The only course open to her was to leave secretly, taking little Ignatia with her, return to her father, and lay before him the dastardly plot now in progress.

Each hour she remained at the palace increased her peril. Once pronounced insane by those three specialists there would be no hope for her. Her enemies would take good care that she was consigned to an asylum, and that her actions were misconstrued into those of a person insane.

Her heart beat quickly as she thought out the best means of secret escape.

To leave that night was quite impossible. Allen was sleeping with Ignatia; and besides, the guards at the palace gate, on seeing her make her exit at that hour, would chatter among themselves, in addition to which there were no express trains to Vienna in the night. The best train was at seven o’clock in the evening, for upon it was a wagon-lit and dining-car that went through to the Austrian capital, via Eger.

About six o’clock in the evening would be the best time to secure the child, for Allen and Henriette would then both be at dinner, and little Ignatia would be in charge of the under-nurse, whom she could easily send away upon some pretext. Besides, at that hour she could secure some of Henriette’s clothes, and with her veil down might pass the sentries, who would probably take her for the French maid herself.

She calculated that her absence would not be noted by her servants till nearly eight; for there was a Court ball on the morrow, and on nights of the balls she always dressed later.

And so, determined to leave the great palace which to her was a prison, she carefully thought over all the details of her flight. On the morrow she would send to the royal treasurer for a sum of money, ostensibly to make a donation to one of her charities.

Presently rising, she closed the shutters, and switching on the electric light, opened the safe in the wall where her jewels were kept – mostly royal heirlooms that were worth nearly a million sterling.

Case after case she drew out and opened. Her two magnificent tiaras, her emerald and diamond necklet, the great emerald pendant, once the property of Catherine di Medici, six wonderful collars of perfect pearls and some other miscellaneous jewels, all of them magnificent, she replaced in the safe, as they were heirlooms of the Kingdom. Those royal tiaras as Crown Princess she placed in their cases and put them away with a sigh, for she knew she was renouncing her crown for ever. Her own jewels, quite equal in magnificence, she took from their cases and placed together upon the bed. There was her magnificent long rope of pearls, that when worn twice twisted around her neck hung to below the knees, and was declared to be one of the finest in the world; her two diamond collars, her wonderful diamond bodice ornaments, her many pairs of earrings, antique brooches, and other jewels – she took them all from their cases until they lay together, a brilliant, scintillating heap, the magnificent gems flashing with a thousand fires.

At last she drew forth a leather case about six inches square, and opening it, gazed upon it in hesitancy. Within was a large true-lover’s knot in splendid diamonds, and attached to it was the black ribbon and the jewelled cross – her decoration as Dame de la Croix Etoilée of Austria, the order bestowed upon the Imperial Archduchesses.

She looked at it wistfully. Sight of it brought to her mind the fact that in renouncing her position she must also renounce that mark of her Imperial birth. Yet she was determined, and with trembling fingers detached the ribbon and cross from the diamond ornament, threw the latter on to the heap upon the bed, and replaced the former with the jewels she intended to leave behind.

The beautiful cross had been bestowed upon her by her uncle the Emperor upon her marriage, and would now be sent back to him.

She took two large silk handkerchiefs from a drawer, and made two bundles of the precious gems. Then she hid them away until the morrow, and reclosing the safe, locked it; and taking the key off the bunch, placed it in the drawer of her little escritoire.

Thus she had taken the first step towards her emancipation.

Her eye caught the Madonna, with its silver lamp, and she halted before it, her head bowed, her lips moving in silent prayer as she sought help, protection, and guidance in the act of renunciation she was about to commit.

Then, after ten minutes or so, she again moved slowly across the room, opening the great inlaid wardrobe where hung a few of her many dresses. She looked upon them in silence. All must be left behind, she decided. She could only take what she could carry in her hand. She would leave her personal belongings to be divided up by that crowd of human wolves who hungered to destroy her. The Trauttenberg might have them as her perquisites – in payment for her treachery.

By that hour to-morrow she would have left Treysa for ever. She would begin a new life – a life of simplicity and of freedom, with her darling child.

Presently she slept again, but it was a restless, fevered sleep. Constantly she wondered whether it would be possible for her to pass those palace guards with little Ignatia. If they recognised the child they might stop her, for only Allen herself was permitted to take her outside the palace.

Yet she must risk it; her only means of escape was that upon which she had decided.

Next day passed very slowly. The hours dragged by as she tried to occupy herself in her boudoir, first with playing with the child, and afterwards attending to her correspondence. She wrote no letter of farewell, as she deemed it wiser to take her leave without a word. Yet even in those last hours of her dignity as Crown Princess her thoughts were with the many charitable institutions of which she was patroness, and of how best she could benefit them by writing orders to the royal treasurer to give them handsome donations in her name.

She saw nothing of her husband. For aught she knew, those three grave-faced doctors might have already consulted with Veltman; they might have already declared her insane.

The afternoon passed, and alone she took her tea in English fashion, little Ignatia being brought to her for half an hour, as was the rule when she was without visitors. She had already been to Henriette’s room in secret, and had secured a black-stuff dress and packet, a long black travelling-coat and a felt canotte, all of which she had taken to her own room and hidden in her wardrobe.

When Allen took the child’s hand in order to lead her out, her mother glanced anxiously at the clock, and saw that it was half-past five.

“You can leave Ignatia here while you go to dinner,” she said in English; “she will be company for me. Tell the servants that I am not to be disturbed, even by the Countess de Trauttenberg.”

“Very well, your Highness,” was the Englishwoman’s answer, as bowing she left the room.

For another quarter of an hour she laughed and played with the child, then said, —

“Come, darling, let us go along to my room.” And taking her tiny hand, led her gently along the corridor to her own chamber. Once within she locked the door, and quickly throwing off her own things, assumed those of the maid which she took from the wardrobe. Then upon Ignatia she put a cheap dark coat of grey material and a dark-blue woollen cap which at once concealed the child’s golden curls. This concluded, she assumed a thick black lace veil, which well concealed her features, and around her throat she twisted a silken scarf. The collar of her coat, turned up, hid the colour of her hair, and her appearance was in a few moments well transformed. Indeed, she presented the exact prototype of her maid Henriette.

The jewels were in a cheap leather hand-bag, also the maid’s property. This she placed in her dressing-bag, and with it in her hand she took up little Ignatia, saying, —

“Hush, darling! don’t speak a word. You’ll promise mother, won’t you?”

The child, surprised at all this preparation, gave her promise, but still remained inquisitive.

Then the Crown Princess Claire gave a final glance around the room, the scene of so much of her bitter domestic unhappiness. Sighing heavily, she crossed herself before the Madonna, uttered a few low words in prayer, and unlocking the door stole out into the long, empty corridor.

Those were exciting moments – the most exciting in all her life.

With her heart beating quickly she sped onward to the head of the great marble gilt staircase. Along one of the side corridors a royal valet was approaching, and the man nodded to her familiarly, believing her to be Henriette.

At the head of the staircase she looked down, but saw nobody. It was the hour when all the servants were at their evening meal. Therefore, descending quickly, she passed through the great winter garden, a beautiful place where, among the palms and flowers, were cunningly placed tiny electric lamps. Across a large courtyard she went – as it was a short cut from that wing of the palace in which her apartments were situated – and at last she reached the main entrance, where stood the head concierge in his cocked hat and scarlet livery, and where idled an agent of police in plain clothes, reading the evening paper.

At her approach they both glanced at her.

She held her breath. What if they stopped her on account of the child?

But summoning all her courage she went forward, compelled to pass them quite closely.

Then as she advanced she nodded familiarly to the gold-laced janitor, who to her relief wished her good-evening, and she passed out into the park.

She had successfully passed through one peril, but there was yet a second – those carefully-guarded gilded gates which gave entrance to the royal demesne. Day and night they were watched by palace servants and the agents of police entrusted with his Majesty’s personal safety.

She sped on down the broad gravelled drive, scarce daring to breathe, and on arrival at the gatehouse passed in it, compelled to make her exit through the small iron turnstile where sat two men, the faithful white-bearded old gatekeeper, who had been fifty years in the royal service, and a dark-faced brigadier of police. Recognition would mean her incarceration in an asylum as insane.

Both men looked up as she entered. It was the supreme moment of her peril. She saw that the detective was puzzled by her veil. But she boldly passed by them, saying in French, in a voice in imitation of Henriette’s, —

“Bon soir, messieurs!”

The old gatekeeper, in his low, gruff German, wished her good-night unsuspiciously, drew the lever which released the turnstile, and next moment the Crown Princess Claire stepped out into the world beyond – a free woman.

Chapter Eleven

Doom or Destiny

With quickened footsteps she clasped the child to her, and hurrying on in the falling gloom, skirted the long, high walls of the royal park, where at equal distances stood the sentries.

More than one, believing her to be Mademoiselle, saluted her.

She was free, it is true; but she had yet to face many perils, the greatest of them all being that of recognition by the police at the station, or by any of the people, to whom her countenance was so well-known.

Presently she gained the broad Klosterstrasse, where the big electric lamps were already shining; and finding a fiacre at the stand, entered it and drove to a small outfitter’s shop, where she purchased two travelling-rugs and a shawl for little Ignatia. Thence she went to a pastrycook’s and bought some cakes, and then drove up the wide Wolbeckerstrasse to the central railway station.

The streets were alive with life, for most of the shops were closed, the main thoroughfares were illuminated, and all Treysa was out at the cafés or restaurants, or promenading the streets, for the day was a national festival. The national colours were displayed everywhere, and the band of the 116th Regiment was playing a selection from “La Bohème” as she crossed the great Domplatz.

Hers was indeed a strange position.

Unknown and unrecognised, she drove in the open cab, with the tiny, wondering Princess at her side, through the great crowds of holiday-makers – those people who had they known of her unhappiness would in all probability have risen in a body and revolted.

She remembered that she had been “their Claire,” yet after that night she would be theirs no longer. It was a sad and silent leave-taking. She had renounced her crown and imperial privileges for ever.

Many men and women stared at her as she passed under the bright electric street lamps, and once or twice she half feared that they might have penetrated her disguise. Yet no cheer was raised; none rushed forward to kiss her hand.

She gave the cabman orders to drive up and down several of the principal thoroughfares, for there was still plenty of time for the train; and, reluctant to take leave of the people of Treysa whom she loved so well, and who were her only friends, she gazed upon them from behind her veil and sighed.

At the busy, echoing station she arrived ten minutes before the express was due, and took her tickets; but when she went to the wagon-lit office, the official, not recognising her, sharply replied that the places had all been taken by an American tourist party. Therefore she was compelled to enter an ordinary first-class compartment. The train was crowded, and all the corner seats were taken. Fearing to call a porter to her assistance lest she should be recognised – when the royal saloon would at once be attached to the train for her – she was compelled to elbow her way through the crowd and take an uncomfortable seat in the centre of a compartment, where all through the night she tried to sleep, but in vain.

Little Ignatia soon closed her eyes and was asleep, but Claire, full of regrets at being compelled to renounce husband, crown, everything, as she had done, and in wonder of what the future had in store for her, sat silent, nursing her child through the long night hours. Her fellow-travellers, two fat Germans of Jewish cast, and three women, slept heavily, the men snoring.

The grey dawn showed at last over the low green hills. Had her absence been discovered? Most certainly it had, but they had now passed the confines of the kingdom, and she was certain that the people at the palace would not telegraph news of her disappearance for fear of creating undue scandal.

At last she had frustrated their dastardly plot to incarcerate her in an asylum. She sat there, a figure of sweet loveliness combined with exceeding delicacy and even fragility – one of the most refined elegance and the most exquisite modesty.

At a small wayside station where they stopped about seven o’clock she bought a glass of coffee, and then they continued until the Austrian frontier at Voitersreuth was reached; and at Eger, a few miles farther on, she was compelled to descend and change carriages, for only the wagon-lit went through to the capital.

It was then eleven o’clock in the morning, and feeling hungry, she took little Ignatia into the buffet and had some luncheon, the child delighted at the novel experience of travelling.

“We are going to see grandfather,” her mother told her. “You went to see him when you were such a wee, wee thing, so you don’t remember him.”

“No,” declared the child with wide-open, wondering eyes; “I don’t remember. Will Allen be there?”

“No, darling, I don’t think so,” was the evasive reply to a question which struck deep into the heart of the woman fleeing from her persecutors.

While Ignatia had her milk, her mother ate her cutlet at the long table among the other hasty travellers, gobbling up their meal and shouting orders to waiters with their mouths full.

Hitherto, when she passed there in the royal saloon, the railway officials had come forward, cap in hand, to salute her as an Imperial Archduchess of Austria; but now, unknown and unrecognised, she passed as an ordinary traveller. Presently, when the Vienna express drew up to the platform, she fortunately found an empty first-class compartment, and continued her journey alone, taking off her hat and settling herself for the remaining nine hours between there and the capital. Little Ignatia was still very sleepy, therefore she made a cushion for her with her cape and laid her full length, while she herself sat in a corner watching the picturesque landscape, and thinking – thinking deeply over all the grim tragedy of the past.

After travelling for three hours, the train stopped at a small station called Protovin, the junction of the line from Prague, whence a train had arrived in connection with the express. Here there seemed quite a number of people waiting upon the platform.

She was looking out carelessly upon them when from among the crowd a man’s eyes met hers. He stared open-mouthed, turned pale, and next instant was at the door. She drew back, but, alas! it was too late. She was without hat or veil, and he had recognised her.

She gave vent to a low cry, half of surprise, half of despair.

Next second the door opened, and the man stood before her, hat in hand.

“Princess!” he gasped in a low, excited voice. “What does this mean? You – alone – going to Vienna?”

“Carl!” she cried, “why are you here? Where have you come from?”

“I have been to my estate up at Rakonitz, before going to Rome,” was his answer. “Is it Destiny that again brings us together like this?”

And entering the carriage, he bent and kissed her hand.

Was it Destiny, or was it Doom?

“You with Ignatia, and no lady-in-waiting? What does this mean?” he inquired, utterly puzzled.

The porter behind him placed his bag in the carriage, while he, in his travelling-ulster and cap, begged permission to remain there.

What could she say? She was very lonely, and she wanted to tell him what had occurred since her return to Treysa and of the crisis of it all. So she nodded in the affirmative.

Then he gave the porter his tip, and the man departed. Presently, before the train moved off, the sleeping child opened her eyes, shyly at first, in the presence of a stranger; but a moment later, recognising him, she got up, and rushing gladly towards him, cried in her pretty, childish way, —

“Leitolf! Good Leitolf to come with us! We are so very tired!”

“Are you, little Highness?” exclaimed the man laughing, and taking her upon his knee. “But you will soon be at your destination.”

“Yes,” she pouted, “but I would not mind if mother did not cry so much.”

The Princess pressed her lips together. She was a little annoyed that her child should reveal the secret of her grief. If she did so to Leitolf she might do so to others.

After a little while, however, the motion of the train lulled the child off to sleep again, and the man laid her down as before. Then, turning to the sorrowing woman at his side, he asked, —

“You had my message – I mean you found it?”

She nodded, but made no reply. She recollected each of those finely-penned words, and knew that they came from the heart of as honest and upright a man as there was in the whole empire.

“And now tell me, Princess, the reason of this second journey to Vienna?” he asked, looking at her with his calm, serious face.

For a moment she held her breath. There were tears welling in her eyes, and she feared lest he might detect them – feared that she might break down in explaining to him the bitter truth.

“I have left Treysa for ever,” she said simply.

He started from his seat and stared at her.

“Left Treysa!” he gasped. “Left the Court – left your husband! Is this really true?”

“It is the truth, Carl,” was her answer in a low, tremulous tone. “I could bear it no longer.”

He was silent. He recognised the extreme gravity of the step she had taken. He recognised, too, that, more serious than all, her unscrupulous enemies who had conspired to drive her from Court had now triumphed.

His brows were knit as he realised all that she was suffering – this pure, beautiful woman, whom he had once loved so fondly, and whose champion he still remained. He knew that the Crown Prince was a man of brutal instinct, and utterly unsuited as husband of a sweet, refined, gentle woman such as Claire. It was, indeed, a tragedy – a dark tragedy.

In a low voice he inquired what had occurred, but she made no mention of the brutal, cowardly blow which had felled her insensible, cut her lip, and broken her white teeth. She only explained very briefly the incident of the three guests at dinner, and the amazing conversation she had afterwards overheard.