Rupert of Hentzau [68]
"Rischenheim," he called, "come here a moment. Here--look out."
Rischenheim obeyed, and Rupert let him look for a minute or two before speaking again.
"Do you see anything remarkable?" he asked then.
"No, nothing," answered Rischenheim, still curt and sullen in his fright.
"Well, no more do I. And that's very odd. For don't you think that Sapt or some other of her Majesty's friends must have gone to the lodge last night?"
"They meant to, I swear," said Rischenheim with sudden attention.
"Then they would have found the king. There's a telegraph wire at Hofbau, only a few miles away. And it's ten o'clock. My cousin, why isn't Strelsau mourning for our lamented king? Why aren't the flags at half-mast? I don't understand it."
"No," murmured Rischenheim, his eyes now fixed on his cousin's face.
Rupert broke into a smile and tapped his teeth with his fingers.
"I wonder," said he meditatively, "if that old player Sapt has got a king up his sleeve again! If that were so--" He stopped and seemed to fall into deep thought. Rischenheim did not interrupt him, but stood looking now at him, now out of the window. Still there was no stir in the streets, and still the standards floated at the summit of the flag staffs. The king's death was not yet known in Strelsau.
"Where's Bauer?" asked Rupert suddenly. "Where the plague can Bauer be? He was my eyes. Here we are, cooped up, and I don't know what's going on."
"I don't know where he is. Something must have happened to him."
"Of course, my wise cousin. But what?"
Rupert began to pace up and down the room, smoking another cigarette at a great pace. Rischenheim sat down by the table, resting his head on his hand. He was wearied out by strain and excitement, his wounded arm pained him greatly, and he was full of horror and remorse at the event which happened unknown to him the night before.
"I wish I was quit of it," he moaned at last. Rupert stopped before him.
"You repent of your misdeeds?" he asked. "Well, then, you shall be allowed to repent. Nay, you shall go and tell the king that you repent. Rischenheim, I must know what they are doing. You must go and ask an audience of the king."
"But the king is--"
"We shall know that better when you've asked for your audience. See here."
Rupert sat down by his cousin and instructed him in his task. This was no other than to discover whether there were a king in Strelsau, or whether the only king lay dead in the hunting lodge. If there were no attempt being made to conceal the king's death, Rupert's plan was to seek safety in flight. He did not abandon his designs: from the secure vantage of foreign soil he would hold the queen's letter over her head, and by the threat of publishing it insure at once immunity for himself and almost any further terms which he chose to exact from her. If, on the other hand, the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim found a king in Strelsau, if the royal standards continued to wave at the summit of their flag staffs, and Strelsau knew nothing of the dead man in the lodge, then Rupert had laid his hand on another secret; for he knew who the king in Strelsau must be. Starting from this point, his audacious mind darted forward to new and bolder schemes. He could offer again to Rudolf Rassendyll what he had offered once before, three years ago--a partnership in crime and the profits of crime--or if this advance were refused, then he declared that he would himself descend openly into the streets of Strelsau and proclaim the death of the king from the steps of the cathedral.
"Who can tell," he cried, springing up, enraptured and merry with the inspiration of his plan, "who can tell whether Sapt or I came first to the lodge? Who found the king alive, Sapt or I? Who left him dead, Sapt or I? Who had most interest in killing him--I, who only sought to make him aware of what touched his honor, or Sapt, who was and is hand and glove with the man that now robs him of his name and usurps his place while his body is still warm? Ah, they haven't done with Rupert of Hentzau yet!"
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