PRINCE WASP STINGS
Margaret did not answer her tormentor's taunt. Her arms went about
Maurice's neck, and her lips, salt with the overflowing of tears, sought
his in a last kiss. The officer of the Prince's guard touched her on the
shoulder. She shook him haughtily off, and then, having completed her
farewells, she loosened her hands and went slowly backward towards the
further end of the hall with her eyes still upon the man she loved.
"Stay, Berghoff," said Prince Louis suddenly; "let the Princess remain
where she is. Cross your swords in front of her. I desire that she shall
hear what I have to say to this young gentleman."
"And also," added Prince Ivan, "I desire the noble Princess to remember
that this has been granted by the Prince upon my intercession. In the
future, it may gain me more of her favour than I have had the good
fortune to enjoy in the past!"
Maurice stood alone, his tall slender figure supple and erect. One hand
rested easily upon his swordless thigh, while the other still held the
plumed hat he snatched up as in frantic haste he had followed Margaret
from the Summer Palace.
There ensued a long silence in which the Sparhawk eyed his captors
haughtily, while Prince Louis watched him from under the grey penthouse
of his eyebrows.
Then three several times the Prince essayed to speak, and as often
utterance was choked within him. His feelings could only find vent in
muttered imprecations, half smothered by a consuming rage. Then Prince
Ivan crossed over and laid his hand restrainingly on his arm. The touch
seemed to calm his friend, and, after swallowing several times as there
had been a knot in his throat, at last he spoke.
For the second time in his life Maurice von Lynar stood alone among his
enemies; but this time in peril far deadlier than among the roisterous
pleasantries of Castle Kernsberg. Yet he was as little daunted now as
then. Once on a time a duchess had saved him. Now a princess loved him.
And even if she could not save him, still that was better.
"So," cried Prince Louis, in the curiously uneven voice of a coward
lashing himself into a fury, "you have played out your treachery upon a
reigning Prince of Courtland. You cheated me at Castle Kernsberg. Now
you have made me a laughing-stock throughout the Empire. You have shamed
a maiden of my house, my sister, the daughter of my father. What have
you to say ere I order you to be flung out from the battlements of the
western tower?"
"Ere it comes to that I shall have something to say, Prince Louis,"
interrupted Prince Wasp, smiling. "We must not waste such dainty powers
of masquerade on anything so vulgar as the hangman's rope."
"Gentlemen and princes," Maurice von Lynar answered, "that which I have
done I have done for the sake of my mistress, the Lady Joan, and I am
not afraid. Prince Louis, it was her will and intent never to come to
Courtland as your wife. She would not have been taken alive. It was
therefore the duty of her servants to preserve her life, and I offered
myself in her stead. My life was hers already, for she had preserved it.
She had given. It was hers to take. With the chief captains of Kernsberg
I plotted that she should be seized and carried to a place of refuge
wherein no foe could even find her. There she abides with chosen men to
guard her. I took her place and was delivered up that Kernsberg might
be cleared of its enemies. Gladly I came that I might pay a little of my
debt to my sovran lady and liege mistress, Joan Duchess of Kernsberg and
Hohenstein."
"Nobly perorated!" cried Prince Ivan, clapping his hands. "Right
sonorously ended. Faith, a paladin, a deliverer of oppressed damsels, a
very carnival masquerader! He will play you the dragon, this fellow, or
he will act Saint George with a sword of lath! He will amble you the
hobby-horse, or be the Holy Virgin in a miracle play. Well, he shall
play in one more good scene ere I have done with him. But, listen, Sir
Mummer, in all this there is no word of the Princess Margaret. How comes
it that you so loudly proclaim having given yourself a noble sacrifice
for one fair lady, when at the same time you are secretly married to
another? Are you a deliverer of ladies by wholesale? Speak to this
point. Let us have another noble period--its subject my affianced bride.
Already we have heard of your high devotion to Prince Louis's wife.
Well--next!"
But it was the Princess who spoke from where she stood behind the
crossed swords of her guards.
"That _I_ will answer. I am a woman, and weak in your hands, princes
both. You have set the grasp of rude men-at-arms upon the wrist of a
Princess of Courtland. But you can never compel her soul. Brother Louis,
my father committed me to you as a little child--have I not been a
loving and a faithful sister to you? And till this Muscovite came
between, were you not good to me? Wherefore have you changed? Why has he
made you cruel to your little Margaret?"
Prince Louis turned towards his sister, moving his hands uncertainly and
even deprecatingly.
Ivan moved quickly to his side and whispered something which instantly
rekindled the light of anger in the weakling's eyes.
"You are no sister of mine," he said; "you have disgraced your family
and yourself. Whether it be true or no that you are married to this man
matters little!"
"It is true; I do not lie!" said Margaret recovering herself.
"So much the worse, then, and he shall suffer for it. At least I can
hide, if I cannot prevent, your shame!"
"I will never give him up; nothing on earth shall part our love!"
Prince Ivan smiled delicately, turning to where she stood at the end of
the hall.
"Sweet Princess," he said, "divorce is, I understand, contrary to your
holy Roman faith. But in my land we have discovered a readier way than
any papal bull. Be good enough to observe this"--he held a dagger in his
hand. "It is a little blade of steel, but a span long, and narrow as one
of your dainty fingers, yet it will divorce the best married pair in the
world."
"But neither dagger nor the hate of enemies can sever love," Margaret
answered proudly. "You may slay my husband, but he is mine still. You
cannot twain our souls."
The Prince shrugged his shoulder and opened his palms deprecatingly.
"Madam," he said, "I shall be satisfied with twaining your bodies. In
holy Russia we are plain men. We have a saying, 'No one hath ever seen a
soul. Let the body content you!' When this gentleman is--what I shall
make him, he is welcome to any communion of souls with you to which he
can attain. I promise you that, so far as he is concerned, you shall
find me neither exigent lover nor jealous husband!"
The Princess looked at Maurice. Her eyes had dwelt defiantly on the
Prince of Muscovy whilst he was speaking, but now a softer light, gentle
yet brave, crept into them.
"Fear not, my husband," she said. "If the steel divide us, the steel can
also unite. They cannot watch so close, or bind so tight, but that I can
find a way. Or, if iron will not pierce, fire burn, or water drown, I
have a drug that will open the door which leads to you. Fear not,
dearest, I shall yet meet you unashamed, and as your loyal wife, without
soil or stain, look into your true eyes."
"I declare you have taught your mistress the trick of words!" cried the
Prince delightedly. "Count von Löen, the Lady Margaret has quite your
manner. She speaks to slow music."
But even the sneers of Prince Ivan could not filch the greatness out of
their loves, and Prince Louis was obviously wavering. Ivan's quick eye
noted this and he instantly administered a fillip.
"Are you not moved, Louis?" he said. "How shamelessly hard is your
heart! This handsome youth, whom any part sets like a wedding favour and
fits like his own delicate skin, condescends to become your relative.
Where is your welcome, your kinsmanlike manners? Go, fall upon his neck!
Kiss him on either cheek. Is he not your heir? He hath only sequestrated
your wife, married your sister. Your only brother is a childless priest.
There needs only your decease to set him on the throne of the Princedom.
Give him time. How easily he has compassed all this! He will manage the
rest as easily. And then--listen to the shouting in the streets. I can
hear it already. 'Long live Maurice the Bastard, Prince of Courtland!'"
And the Prince of Muscovy laughed loud and long. But Prince Louis did
not laugh. His eyes glared upon the prisoner like those of a wild beast
caught in a corner whence it wishes to flee but cannot.
"He shall die--this day shall be his last. I swear it!" he cried. "He
hath mocked me, and I will slay him with my hand."
He drew the dagger from his belt. But in the centre of the hall the
Sparhawk stood so still and quiet that Prince Louis hesitated. Ivan laid
a soft hand upon his wrist and as gently drew the dagger out of his
grasp.
"Nay, my Prince, we will give him a worthier passing than that. So noble
a knight-errant must die no common death. What say you to the Ukraine
Cross, the Cross of Steeds? I have here four horses, all wild from the
steppes. This squire of dames, this woman-mummer, hath, as now we know,
four several limbs. By a strange coincidence I have a wild horse for
each of these. Let limbs and steeds be severally attached, my Cossacks
know how. Upon each flank let the lash be laid--and--well, the Princess
Margaret is welcome to her liege lord's soul. I warrant she will not
desire his fair body any more."
At this Margaret tottered, her knees giving way beneath her, so that her
guards stood nearer to catch her if she should fall.
"Louis--my brother," she cried, "do not listen to the monster. Kill my
husband if you must--because I love him. But do not torture him. By the
last words of our mother, by the memory of our father, by your faith in
the Most Pitiful Son of God, I charge you--do not this devilry."
Prince Ivan did not give Louis of Courtland time to reply to his
sister's appeal.
"The most noble Princess mistakes," he murmured suavely. "Death by the
Cross of Steeds is no torture. It is the easiest and swiftest of deaths.
I have witnessed it often. In my country it is reserved for the greatest
and the most distinguished. No common felon dies by the Cross of Steeds,
but men whose pride it is to die greatly. Ere long we will show you on
the plain across the river that I speak the truth. It is a noble sight,
and all Courtland shall be there. What say you, Louis? Shall this
springald seat himself in your princely chair, or--shall we try the
Cross of the Ukraine?"
"Have it your own way, Prince Ivan!" said Louis, and went out without
another word. The Muscovite stood a moment looking from Maurice to
Margaret and back again. He was smiling his inscrutable Oriental smile.
"The Prince has given me discretion," he said at last. "I might order
you both to separate dungeons, but I am an easy man and delight in the
domestic affections. I would see the parting of two such faithful
lovers. I may learn somewhat that shall stand me in good stead in the
future. It is my ill-fortune that till now I have had little experience
of the gentler emotions."
He raised his hand.
"Let the Princess pass," he cried.
The guards dropped their swords to their sides. They had been
restraining her with as much gentleness as their duty would permit.
Instantly the Princess Margaret ran forward with eager appeal on her
face. She dropped on her knees before the Prince of Muscovy and clasped
her hands in supplication.
"Prince Ivan," she said, "I pray you for the love of God to spare him,
to let him go. I promise never to see him more. I will go to a nunnery.
I will look no more upon the face of day."
"That, above all things, I cannot allow," said the Prince. "So fair a
face must see many suns--soon, I trust, in Moscow city, and by my side."
"Margaret," said the Sparhawk, "it is useless to plead. Do not abase
yourself in the presence of our enemy. You cannot touch a man's heart
when his breast covers a stone. Bid me goodbye and be brave. The time
will not be long."
From the place where Margaret the loving woman had kneeled Margaret the
Princess rose to her feet at the word of her husband. Without deigning
even to glance at Ivan, who had stooped to assist her, she passed him by
and went to Von Lynar. He held out both his hands and took her little
trembling ones in a strong assured clasp.
The Prince watched the pair with a chill smile.
"Margaret," said Maurice, "this will not be for long. What matters the
ford, so that we both pass over the river. Be brave, little wife. The
crossing will not be wide, nor the water deep. They cannot take from us
that which is ours. And He who joined us, whose priest blessed us, will
unite us anew when and where it seemeth good to Him!"
"Maurice, I cannot let you die--and by such a terrible death!"
"Dearest, what does it matter? I am yours. Wherever my spirit may
wander, I am yours alone. I will think of you when the Black Water
shallows to the brink. On the further side I will wait a day and then
you will meet me there. To you it may seem years. It will be but a day
to me. And I shall be there. So, little Margaret, good-night. Do not
forget that I love you. I would have made you very happy, if I had had
time--ah, if I had had time!"
Like a child after its bedside prayer she lifted up her face to be
kissed.
"Good-night, Maurice," she said simply. "Wait for me; I shall not be
long after!"
She laid her brow a moment on his breast. Then she lifted her head and
walked slowly and proudly out of the hall. The guard fell in behind her,
and Maurice von Lynar was left alone with the Prince of Muscovy.
As the door closed upon the Princess a sudden devilish grimace of fury
distorted the countenance of Prince Ivan. Hitherto he had been
studiously and even caressingly courteous. But now he strode swiftly up
to his captive and smote him across the mouth with the back of his
gauntleted hand.
"That!" he said furiously, "that for the lips which have kissed hers!
Soon, soon I shall pay the rest of my debt. Yes, by the most high God, I
will pay it--with usury thereto!"
A thin thread of scarlet showed upon the white of Maurice von Lynar's
chin and trickled slowly downwards. But he uttered no word. Only he
looked his enemy very straightly in the eyes, and those of the Muscovite
dropped before that defiant fierce regard.