Rulers of kings: A novel

by Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

Fessenden was walking restlessly about the hall of the castle, awaiting the finish of Ranata’s visit of duty at the bedside of her duenna. There was a prospect, for the first time in several days, of an hour with her alone. Zrinyi, Prince Illehazy, Vilma, and Alexandra had gone for a walk, and Piroska had not been seen that day.

They had arrived two days before, after three, in a special train with many pauses and no solitudes, and until now had been a gay and united party. Alexandra had announced herself satisfied with the castle; but as her tone had been frivolous, Zrinyi had forborne to press his suit. The roughness of the old days of border warfare was curiously blended with the modern comforts of a nobleman’s hunting-lodge. The staircase, towards which Fessenden directed eyes of impatient longing, looked as if no woman had ever descended it, although many women had huddled there when the Turkish guns were battering. The logs in the old fireplace, and the big ornamental stones which have superseded andirons in the greater part of Europe, tempered the ancient cold; the rough walls and floors were covered with the skins of wild beasts and other trophies of the chase; and the chairs at least were comfortable. The hall was a museum of old battle-flags, captured from the Turks, Austrians, rival clans in the days of the Oligarchs, and of weapons as old and varied. The castle was very large, and had been surrounded on three sides by a double moat; but to former implements of war it had been impregnable, and the unsquandered wealth of the family had kept every part of it from decay except the entrance wall. Fessenden thought it an admirable setting for a honeymoon; failing that, for a few days’ final courtship.

But his patience, never a gift of Nature, but a creation of his will, was close upon its finish, and the day he left Budapest he had set his train in motion. Only his habit of playing a close and far-seeing game had saved him from some precipitate act which might have wrecked his hopes; for the blood was often in his head. Whether or not Mr. Abbott had had such a crisis as this in mind when he trained his son in the qualities that conquer, in no other way had they served Fessenden so well. He was pitting his wit and his wealth against the mightiest prejudice which existed in the world of his day; and his victory over Ranata must spring solely from the former, for without it her love would avail him nothing. Had he been able to conquer her prejudices by any of the arts of love or passion he would have urged a flight from this castle—which was far from communication with the telegraph, and where the sympathetic Zrinyi would have kept guardians and spies imprisoned—to Trieste, where his yacht awaited him. But he knew that Ranata, although capable of a revolution which would raze the first wall between them, must accomplish that revolution in solitude and despair, under the pressure of circumstances which he had already shaped. The demolishment of the second wall might cost him something almost as dear as the woman, but Fessenden was prepared to sacrifice more than that.

Fortunate for the great affairs of the house of Abbott, that the senior was particularly well at this time! The heir, for all his self-control, was in a state of mind which, had he been compelled to return—and nothing short of his father’s death or a financial panic would have drawn him across the seas—would have lost him the faith of Wall Street.

Since his violent attack of calf-love and the strange illuminations which had succeeded it, he had looked upon woman with a critical eye, and treasured his inmost feelings with a jealous care. Never again, he had determined long since, would he go through that futile agony at the instance of anything less than death; when he found the one woman whom he could love more than his life or his ambitions—or as well—then would he pour all he had husbanded at her feet; but he would have her unless the Almighty himself intervened. Busy as was his life, he had been sharply aware of its incompleteness; there had been many hours of longing for the deep companionship of love, for the perfection of his own soul and manhood. The vague ideal of his dreams he had not recognized in Ranata’s physical part when they met in the cottage, his sense of adventure being keener than any vital longing, and the fury of the dance excluding mental knowledge of his partner. But he had discovered her not long after; and the great measure that he had to offer of homage and love and passion had since burned steadily; with a less strong brain the flame would have been less steady, and the rare moments of solitude with her, and their temptations, might have overwhelmed him: he had never imagined a woman who could so crowd into a moment the concentrated essence of all the melting tenderness and the passionate energy that made up the surrender of woman. It is true that more than once the temptation had assailed him to use her weakness as the shortest way out of the difficulties that beset him; but not only had he so far never taken advantage of any one but a scoundrel, and did he still hold women in an old-fashioned reverence, but he forecast the weeks—perhaps months—asunder, when in desperation she might marry any prince her father selected. And in his cooler moments he tingled at the thought of a victory which would be as great for his young country as for himself, of being the chosen instrument to initiate a new order of things as inevitable as the progress of the world. Romantic as he was, the campaign he had planned—where the only weapons should be his own wit and the millions which the world, with its curious love of self-delusion, affects to despise, typifying as they do modern life itself—appealed to him more powerfully than a flight across a picturesque country of many costumes to his yacht, or a rescue from the palace of Buda. But at present he was not rehearsing his plan of campaign; the coming moment commanded his imagination, and the blood was beginning to pound in his ears when he heard the light rustle of her garments. He sprang up the stairs and met her on the first landing.

“Not here!” she said nervously. “Sarolta is in bed, and Piroska has a toothache; but who knows?”

“Has it ever occurred to you that the Countess Piroska is a spy?” he asked as they crossed the hall to the room Zrinyi called his study, although it had not a book in it.

“Possibly,” said Ranata indifferently. “We are accustomed to spies. That is usually one of the duties of the Obersthofmeisterin. But as Sarolta is too wealthy to be bought, and is of a proved fondness for me, I suppose Count von Königsegg thought it wise to have one in my household he could count on. I doubt if she has made any report of consequence so far, for she has bided her time, hoping that the worst would happen; but she will, for she wants to marry you. But it will matter little now! Our time is almost up!”

She spoke in a tone of profound dejection. The serenity she had maintained in Sarolta’s presence had dropped from her like a mask. In a moment she withdrew from his embrace and leaned against the window-frame and stared down into the ravine where so many Turks had mouldered to dust.

“It is time for the comedy to end,” she said sharply. “Sarolta knows, and before long will interfere. Königsegg is sure to interrogate Piroska before long, if he has not done so already, and there must be many comments in Budapest and Vienna on your long stay here and your constant presence in the palace. Moreover, it is impossible you should remain away from America much longer. The two months you set yourself have nearly passed. Let us talk plainly. My capacity for self-deception is at an end—indeed, for days past it has slipped from me again and again—and I am worried about many other things—”