Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07 (20 page)

“Of love.”

Again the pink of her
cheeks deepened slightly as she exclaimed: “You
must
not talk to me like this. Now that you know who I am,
you have no right to do so.”

“I know only that you are
the most lovely person in the world.”

To that she did not
reply, and they circled the room in silence again. Then he asked, “Will you sit
out with me somewhere in the interval after this dance?”

She shook her head. “No.
That is impossible. You must take me back to the dais immediately the band
stops.”

“Then, when may I see you
again?”

“As it is my duty to
appear often in public no doubt an opportunity for you to do so will soon occur.”

“You are unkind,” he
murmured reproachfully. “I meant, to talk to you—to tell you how I treasure the
memory of that kiss more than anything in my whole life.”

She hesitated a second,
then burst out: “I have no wish to talk to you again. That first time the
things you said were excusable. You thought me then some little heiress of no
account. But now you are aware of the gulf that separates us, it is an
impertinence to embarrass me in this fashion, and I will not permit it.”

A wave of depression
surged through him. This dance, to which he had been looking forward so
eagerly, had begun so well, but somehow the secret bond that seemed to have
been established between them had showed signs of strain almost from the
beginning, and now she had made it plain that she had no further use for him.
Surely, he thought, she would not have asked him to dance solely to pronounce
her formal forgiveness on a matter that they both knew was already forgiven.
She must have expected him to make love to her and, granted that, he had not
said anything to which she could take exception. He did not understand her
attitude, but in view of their positions there was nothing he could do other
than accept it. So he said with a sigh:

“A cat may look at a
king, Princess, and to every man there comes at least once in a lifetime a
woman for whom he would dare everything, and of whom he dreams fond dreams. It
is my misfortune that I should not only have looked at, but talked to, you; and
so incurred your displeasure. But after to-night I will not trouble you again
with my presence, and in the meantime you may rest assured that I will treat
Your Imperial Highness only with the profound respect that is your due.”

Twice more they danced
round the room together, both highly conscious of the horrid silence that now
hung like an invisible barrier between them, but neither made any attempt to
break it. Then the band stopped. After their last pirouette, he continued to
hold for a second the youthful form, shimmering with rubies and diamonds, while
he looked straight down into the lovely face so near his own. But she kept her
glance averted, so, with a frigid bow, he led her back to the dais.

As they drew near it he
noticed, almost subconsciously, that the Duchess of Hohenberg had her dark eyes
fixed upon him, and when Ilona resumed her chair the Duchess spoke. By natural
law she should have been the first lady in the land, but as matters stood she
remained in rank far the inferior of her beautiful young cousin-by-marriage, so
she addressed her with a familiarity that was tempered with deference.

“Your Highness excelled
yourself in the last dance. You seem to have found a perfect partner. Will you
not present him to us?”

Ilona had recovered her
sang-froid and, with the social smile that habit had already accustomed her to
assume spontaneously, she performed the introduction. Franz-Ferdinand gave the
Duke a cold appraising look. He was a morbidly suspicious man, and had once
remarked to his Chief of Staff, ‘You expect that every man will prove an angel.
For my part, I always assume that anyone I see for the first time is a
scoundrel, and later on, if possible, I revise my opinion’. Nevertheless, the
mouth below his dark moustache, which curled up at its ends, parted in a polite
smile, and he offered the Duke his hand. With a much more friendly smile, the
Duchess extended hers and De Richleau kissed it with the same low obeisance he
would have made had she actually been a royal personage.

The Archduke inquired if
he knew Vienna well, and was enjoying his visit. He made a suitable answer, and
was then asked if he travelled much. He replied by speaking of his big
game-hunting expeditions and the wars in which he had been involved.
Franz-Ferdinand’s heavy face immediately brightened, and once again the Duke
had cause to bless the fact that his experience as a general in the Turkish
army seemed a sure passport to arousing the curiosity of Austria’s military
chiefs; for the Archduke said:

“This interests me very
much. I should like to hear your views on the possible performance of the
Turkish army now that it has had a breathing space to recover. Be pleased to
make yourself known to one of my aides-de-camp, and ask him to arrange a time
when we can have a talk together.”

“I shall be most happy to
place myself at Your Imperial Highness’ disposal,” replied the Duke. Then, as
the band began a two-step, the plump, well-corseted Duchess leaned towards him
and said:

“If you fight as well as
you dance, Duke, you must be a great general. But in Vienna we count dancing
more important, and I should like to have you for my partner in this one.”

Obediently he led her
out, and they had been dancing scarcely a minute before she looked down at his
shirt-front and asked, “How did you earn such a highly-prized decoration?”

He was wearing the Order
of the Golden Fleece, to which very few people, apart from royalty, were
entitled. He was a Knight of several Orders of Chivalry, but had decided to
wear this most illustrious one to-night because such a distinction might make
it less remarkable that Ilona should single him out for a partner. Now he was
quick to realize that the ambitious Duchess had noticed it at once, and was far
less interested in his dancing than in his potentialities as a man who, by his
possession of that Order, had the right to address kings as ‘cousin’.

“I make no claim to merit
it,” he said modestly, “but His Majesty of Spain presented me with it in
recognition of a somewhat unusual service that I was fortunate enough to render
him a few years ago.”

“You know him well, then?”

“Fairly intimately. I
have, too, a great admiration for King Alfonso. He is one of the few monarchs
who today still embody the charm, broad-mindedness, courage and intelligence,
which the best kings of the past displayed. I mean, in the days when kingship
was no mere matter of inheritance, but an art that demanded great personality
to win adherents and keep a throne.”

She gave him a quick
look. “How I agree! The stupidity and narrow-mindedness of some of the present
crowned heads of Europe positively maddens me. But let us change the subject
before I begin to talk treason.”

He laughed. “Your
Highness has good cause. And I assure you your secrets would be safe with me,
for I believe a constitutional monarchy to be the best of all forms of
government, but that many of those in Europe are doomed unless fresh, healthy
blood can be introduced into the effete stock of some of the ruling families.”

The Duchess Sophie did
not accept his invitation to confide in him, nor had he expected her to do so,
but a pleasant conspiratorial feeling had been engendered between them, and for
the rest of the dance they got on excellently, so that when it ended she made
him
promise to call upon her.

Shortly afterwards he
decided to go home, as he was in no mood for further dancing. His presentation
to Franz-Ferdinand and his wife had been a piece of real good fortune, but that
did not make up for his disappointment over Ilona. He thought that perhaps
while abroad she had been like a person on a long sea voyage, which makes
people peculiarly susceptible to new outlooks and emotions that are swiftly
counteracted by the habits of a lifetime on their return home. Or it might be
that he had flattered himself unduly, and allowed his imagination to read more
into her last words to him on the boat than she had intended. But, whatever the
reason, it was clear that she had no intention of entering on even a
flirtation, much less a love affair, with him.

He tried to console
himself with the thought that he was probably well out of trouble, and that an
affair with her might have seriously hampered him in his mission. But neither
idea carried conviction. He had risked his life too often to be seriously
concerned at incurring the displeasure of her family, and knew that, once he
was free to do so. he would willingly have gambled a term of imprisonment
against the chance to feel her lips against his again. As for his mission, had
it not been for her the odds were all against his having yet got to know Franz-Ferdinand
and his wife, Conrad von H
ö
tzendorf,
Count Berchtold, the Aulendorfs, Adam Grünne, and a dozen other important
people, through whom he now had an excellent chance of forming a sound
appreciation of Austria’s attitude in the event of trouble with Serbia.

His eight days in Vienna
had been far from wasted, but as he went to bed he decided that better results
might come from the leads he had secured if he did not appear eager to follow
them up too quickly, and that in any case a change of scene would help him to
banish Ilona’s image from his mind: so the coming evening he would take the
train to Belgrade and begin his investigations in the Serbian capital.

He had already received a
note from General von Hötzendorf, confirming their luncheon date and asking him
to be at the Arsenal by twelve o’clock, in order that they could have a talk
before the meal: so on the following morning he set out in good time for his
appointment. A taxi carried him swiftly along The Ring as far as the
Schwarzenberg Palace, then south-westward for over a mile along the wall of its
garden and through the Schwarzer Park to his destination.

It was the first time he
had visited the Arsenal, and he was much impressed by its size. The area it
covered was considerably greater than that of the Hofburg and it contained as
many buildings, but all set out in accordance with a geometrical plan. The
whole formed a rectangle enclosed by a colossal wall of over a mile and a half
in length which, with its corner and flanking towers, was castellated in
imitation of the battlements of an ancient fortress, although it was obvious
that it had been built in comparatively recent times. It housed not only an
armaments foundry, but also, like the Invalides in Paris, a big military
museum, as well as the headquarters of the General Staff.

Von Hötzendorf received
the Duke with a brisk business-like air, and led him at once to a room in which
a great map of the Balkans had already been pinned up on the wall. Without
preamble, he asked his visitor to give him a résumé of the campaign and his
reasons for the defeats the Turkish armies had sustained. For the best part of
an hour De Richleau obliged, answered a score of shrewd questions, and pointed
out various instances in which, although the Turks were outnumbered, better
tactics might have enabled them to stave off defeat.

The little dark,
wizened-faced General was obviously impressed, not only with De Richleau’s
military knowledge, but also with his grasp of the ambitions and pressures
which animated the Balkan States. And as they went in to lunch he turned the
conversation to international affairs.

Von Hötzendorf was by
nature an ascetic. For years he had worked like a demon and denied himself
every comfort in order that, by subordinating all personal pleasures to duty,
he might set an example to the officers under him. So the lunch was meagre and
the wine poor; but, connoisseur as the Duke was, he never gave that a thought.
It soon became apparent to him that his host was as much a master of foreign
affairs as he was of military matters. His mind seemed to be crammed with
particulars of treaties, conventions, pacts, minorities and their ambitions,
personalities of courts and cabinets, and the extent of their influence on
their governments. Moreover, he made no secret of the fact that he considered
it part of his task to so manipulate his country’s diplomacy that, should the
Austrian army ever be called upon to strike, it should not be hampered in its
operations by uncertainty of the intentions of other neighbouring states.

Clearly, De Richleau’s
Austrian title caused von Hötzendorf to regard his guest as half-Austrian, and
the Duke having fought for the Turks against Austria’s traditional enemies, the
Serbs, led further to the belief that his sympathies were wholly so. In
consequence, as they ate their cheese and biscuits, the General spoke with
blunt frankness on Austria’s situation as he saw it.

He said that for half a
lifetime he had watched with acute anxiety the increasing peril of the Empire.
The spread of education had resulted in an enormous growth of the separatist
movements among her subject peoples. Influential bodies of Hungarians, Czechs,
Rumanians, Yugoslavs, Italians and Croats were constantly agitating for powers
of self-government which, if granted, could only lead eventually to their
complete break-away from the old Imperial system. Worse, Austria was surrounded
by greedy enemies who secretly encouraged these minorities, not for the sake of
the people in them, but for the territories they occupied. Rumania wanted
Transylvania; Serbia, Bosnia; Russia, Galicia; and Italy, the Trientino and
Trieste. Therefore, unless Austrian diplomacy could at all times secure the
goodwill of a majority of these potential enemies, all of them together might
one day fall upon her and rend her to pieces.