That night, while the Felatrune ploughed her moonlit way southwards over the dim waters of the sleeping Adriatic, Malakopf dined at the Palace. Indeed, the two conspirators, to the best of their knowledge, had solid ground for self-congratulation. From their point of view, the Princess’s conduct had been impeccable, and the precision with which she had played into their hands was admirable. The hours of her attendance at the Assembly during the past summer could almost be reckoned on the fingers of a one-armed man; the hours of her presence at the club were more like in number to the stars of heaven. To crown all this, she had now left the kingdom at a time when its affairs were in the full bustle of transaction, and, what would tell against her even more in the eyes of the public, she had decided to be absent on the great festal day of the year. Malakopf had had the wit to see how skilful was the bait she had prepared, how admirable its convenience to their plans; he only failed to grasp the little fact that it was bait.
The club which the Princess had inaugurated with such brilliance in May had thrived in a way that even she could scarce have anticipated. Originally the playing-rooms had been open only from three in the afternoon till three in the morning; but a few months afterwards its session never rose. The gambling instinct in the people, for so many years void of fruition, shot up like the aloe flower; already to tamper with the inalienable right of the people of Rhodopé to gamble in public rooms would have been more dangerous than to attempt to make penal in England cold baths or the game of golf; and it was the most skilful stroke that the ingenuity of the devil could have devised when Malakopf attempted by this very means to dethrone Sophia from her popularity.
‘It has occurred to you,’ said the Prime Minister that evening, when he and Petros were smoking, ‘that the Princess will be absent from Rhodopé on the day that the Assembly is prorogued?’
‘I have talked to her about that,’ said Petros. ‘It seemed to me very irregular; but she told me how to act.’
‘Indeed! May I have the benefit of your conversation?’
‘She wished me to take her place absolutely,’ said Petros; ‘to speak from the throne not in her name, but in my own.’
‘Admirable!—nothing could be better,’ said Malakopf. ‘It did not occur to you, I am afraid, to get that in black and white?’
‘The Princess does not go back on her word,’ said Petros rather stiffly.
‘True; but I should have preferred black and white. Prudence can never be at fault. But we have our hands full.’
He paused, and decided to tell the Prince of the plan that he had been maturing.