Now at last the old King’s hour had come. Mostly he slept, as though
his body, eager for its long rest, had already given up the struggle.
Stimulants, given by his devoted physician, had no effect. Other
physicians there were, a group of them, but it was Doctor Wiederman who
stood by the bed and waited.
Father Gregory, his friend of many years, had come again from Etzel, and
it was he who had administered the sacrament. The King had roused for
it, and had smiled at the father.
“So!” he said, almost in a whisper, “you would send me clean! It is hard
to scour an old kettle.”
Doctor Wiederman bent over the bed. “Majesty,” he implored, “if there is
anything we can do to make you comfortable--”
“Give me Hubert’s picture,” said the King. When his fingers refused to
hold it, Annunciata came forward swiftly and held it before him. But his
heavy eyes closed. With more intuition than might have been expected
of her, the Archduchess laid it on the white coverlet, and placed her
father’s hand on it.
The physicians consulted in an alcove. Annunciata went back to her
restless, noiseless pacing of the room. Father Gregory went to a window,
and stared out. He saw, not the silent crowd in the Place, but many
other things; the King, as a boy, chafing under the restraint of Court
ceremonial; the King, as a young man, taking a wife who did not love
him. He saw the King madly in love with his wife, and turning to
excesses to forget her. Then, and for this the old priest thanked the
God who was so real to him, he saw the Queen bear children, and turning
to her husband because he was their father. They had lived to love
deeply and’ truly.
Then had come the inevitable griefs. The Queen had died, and had been
saved a tragedy, for Hubert had been violently done to death. And now
again a tragedy had come, but one the King would never know.
The two Sisters of Mercy stood beside the bed, and looked down at the
quiet figure.
“I should wish to die so,” whispered the elder. “A long life, filled
with many deeds, and then to sleep away!”
“A long life, full of many sorrows!” observed the younger one, her eyes
full of tears. “He has outlived all that he loved.”
“Except the little Otto.”
Their glances met, for even here there was a question.
As if their thought had penetrated the haze which is, perhaps, the mist
that hides from us the gates of heaven, the old King opened his eyes.
“Otto!” he said. “I--wish--”
Annunciata bent over him. “He is coming, father,” she told him, with
white lips.
She slipped to her knees beside the bed, and looked up to Doctor
Wiederman with appealing eyes.
“I am afraid,” she whispered. “Can you not--?”
He shook his head. She had asked a question in her glance, and he
had answered. The Crown Prince was gone. Perhaps the search would be
successful. Could he not be held, then, until the boy was found? And
Doctor Wiederman had answered “No.”
In the antechamber the Council waited, standing and without speech. But
in an armchair beside the door to the King’s room the Chancellor sat,
his face buried in his hands. In spite of precautions, in spite of
everything, the blow had fallen. The Crown Prince, to him at once son
and sovereign, the little Crown Prince, was gone. And his old friend,
his comrade of many years, lay at his last hour.
Another regiment left the Palace, to break ranks beyond the crowd,
and add to the searchers. They marched to a muffled drum. As the sound
reached him, the old warrior stirred. He had come to this, he who
had planned, not for himself, but for his country. And because he was
thinking clearly, in spite of his grief, he saw that his very ambition
for the boy had been his undoing. In the alliance with Karnia he had
given the Terrorists a scourge to flay the people to revolt.
Now he waited for the King’s death. Waited numbly. For, with the tolling
of St. Stefan’s bell would rise the cry for the new King.
And there was no King.
In the little room where the Sisters kept their medicines, so useless
now, Hedwig knelt at the Prie-dieu and prayed.
She tried to pray for her grandfather’s soul, but she could not. Her one
cry was for Otto, that he be saved and brought back. In the study she
had found the burntwood frame, and she held it hugged close to her with
its broken-backed “F,” its tottering “W,” and wavering “O”, with its fat
Cupids in sashes, and the places where an over-earnest small hand had
slipped.
Hilda stood by the stand, and fingered the bottles. Her nose was swollen
with crying, but she was stealthily removing corks and sniffing at the
contents of the bottles with the automatic curiosity of the young.
The King roused again. “Mettlich?” he asked.
The elder Sister tiptoed to the door and opened it. The Council turned,
dread on their faces. She placed a hand on the Chancellor’s shoulder.
“His Majesty has asked for you.”
When he looked up, dazed, she bent down and took his hand.
“Courage!” she said quietly.
The Chancellor stood a second inside the door. Then he went to the
side of the bed, and knelt, his lips to the cold, white hand on the
counterpane.
“Sire!” he choked. “It is I--Mettlich.”
The King looked at him, and placed his hand on the bowed gray head. Then
his eyes turned to Annunciata and rested there. It was as if he saw her,
not as the embittered woman of late years, but as the child of the woman
he had loved.
“A good friend, and a good daughter,” he said clearly. “Few men die so
fortunate, and fewer sovereigns.” His hand moved from Mettlich’s head,
and rested on the photograph.
The elder Sister leaned forward and touched his wrist. “Doctor!” she
said sharply.
Doctor Wiederman came first, the others following. They grouped around
the bed. Then the oldest of them, who had brought Annunciata into the
world, touched her on the shoulder.
“Madame!” he said. “Madame, I--His Majesty has passed away.”
Mettlich staggered to his feet, and took a long look at the face of his
old sovereign and king.
In the mean time, things had been happening in the room where the
Council waited. The Council, free of the restraint of the Chancellor’s
presence, had fallen into low-voiced consultation. What was to be done?
They knew already the rumors of the streets, and were helpless before
them. They had done what they could. But the boy was gone, and the city
rising. Already the garrison of the fortress had been ordered to the
Palace, but it could not arrive before midnight. Friese had questioned
the wisdom of it, at that, and was for flight as soon as the King died.
Bayerl, on the other hand, urged a stand, in the hope that the Crown
Prince would be found.
Their voices, lowered at first, rose acrimoniously; almost they
penetrated to the silent room beyond. On to the discussion came Nikky
Larisch, covered with dust and spotted with froth from his horse. He
entered without ceremony, his boyish face drawn and white, his cap gone,
his eyes staring.
“The Chancellor?” he said.
Some one pointed to the room beyond.
Nikky hesitated. Then, being young and dramatic, even in tragedy, he
unbuckled his sword-belt and took it off, placing it on a table.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “I have come to surrender myself.”
The Council stared.
“For what reason?” demanded Marschall coldly.
“I believe it is called high treason.” He closed his eyes for a moment.
“It is because of my negligence that this thing has happened. He was in
my charge, and I left him.”
No one said anything. The Council looked at a loss, rather like a flock
of sheep confronting some strange animal.
“I would have shot myself,” said Nikky Larisch, “but it was too easy.”
Then, rather at a loss as to the exact etiquette of arresting one’s
self, he bowed slightly and waited.
The door into the King’s bedchamber opened.
The Chancellor came through, his face working. It closed behind him.
“Gentlemen of the Council,” he said. “It is my duty my duty--to
announce--” His voice broke; his grizzled chin quivered; tears rolled
down his cheeks. “Friends,” he said pitifully, “our good King--my old
comrade--is dead!”
The birthday supper was over. It had ended with an American ice-cream,
brought in carefully by Pepy, because of its expensiveness. They had cut
the cake with Boby on the top, and the Crown Prince had eaten far more
than was good for him.
He sat, fingering the Lincoln penny and feeling extremely full and very
contented.
Then, suddenly, from a far-off church a deep-toned bell began to toll
slowly.
Prince Ferdinand William Otto caught it. St. Stefan’s bell! He sat up
and listened. The sound was faint; one felt it rather than heard it, but
the slow booming was unmistakable. He got up and pushed his chair back.
Other bells had taken it up, and now the whole city seemed alive with
bells--bells that swung sadly from side to side, as if they said over
and over: “Alas, alas!”
Something like panic seized Ferdinand William Otto. Some calamity had
happened. Some one was perhaps his grandfather.
He turned an appealing face to Mrs. Thorpe. “I must go,” he said: “I do
not wish to appear rude, but something is wrong. The bells--”
Pepy had beet listening, too. Her broad face worked. “They mean but
one thing,” she said slowly. “I have heard it said many times. When St.
Stefan’s tolls life that, the King is dead!”
“No! No!” cried Ferdinand William Otto and ran madly out of the door.