Subsequently Oscar had a long interview with the head of his secret police, with whom he had lately had every reason to be satisfied: secret printing-presses of anarchist papers, which were continually being distributed, had been ferreted out; a plot to wreck the imperial train on its way from Castel Xaveria, the summer-palace in Xara, to Lipara had been frustrated; suspicion of being connected with anarchist committees had fallen upon a clerk in one of the government-offices and even upon a young officer and it was proved that the suspicion was correct in both cases. Quite recently the police had discovered a workshop in which men were taught how to manufacture dynamite-bombs and infernal machines. But who the insolent miscreants were who succeeded in flinging their threatening letters into the emperor's own room: this they had not been able to discover. For a whole week the windows had been watched from the park and all that time nothing had been seen; it was now a couple of days since that secret watch had been given up. The head of the secret police felt convinced that the culprits were lurking in the Imperial itself and acquainted with the emperor's private habits. Sudden visits were paid to the rooms of any servants at the Imperial of whom there was the least doubt; and, when a groom was found to be in possession of an anarchist leaflet containing words of insult directed against the emperor, the man was banished to one of the convict sections of the eastern quick-silver-mines. This banishment was the introduction to numberless other banishments; they followed one another in quick succession; the victims were soldiers, sailors, many minor provincial officials: the press had even ceased to report all the banishments. The censorship was rendered more severe; newspapers were continually being suspended, their editors fined and imprisoned; the imperialist papers, Count Myxila's organs, almost despotically indicated the required tone. A socialist meeting was dispersed by hussars with drawn swords; serious disturbances followed in the capital and infected the other large towns, Thracyna, Xara, even Altara. A strike of dock-labourers filled Lipara for weeks with rising insubordination; policemen were cruelly murdered at the docks in broad daylight.
The Duke of Mena-Doni was the Emperor Oscar's right hand during this period; and his rough displays of force kept the capital so far in subjection that no riot burst out, that the everyday life of sunny, laughing luxury went on, that the elegant carriages continued every afternoon at five o'clock to stream to the Elizabeth Parks, where the Empress or the Duchess of Xara still showed themselves daily for a moment. But thousands of protecting eyes were secretly supervising this apparent carelessness; the troops were confined to barracks; gleaming escorts of cuirassiers accompanied the imperial landaus.
The empress also had asked Othomar to abandon his solitary morning rides and never to show himself unattended. The Duke and Duchess of Xara inhabited the Crown Palace, a comparatively new building on the quays, where they kept up an extensive court; and in this palace the emperor also caused domiciliary visits to be made and it appeared that there were anarchists lurking among the staff.
This treason within their very palaces kept the empress in a constant shudder of terror: she lived in these days an unceasing life of dread whenever she was separated from the emperor. For she was least terrified when she showed herself by Oscar's side, at exhibitions, at public ceremonies, at the Opera; and this was strange: she did not at such times think of him, but, if they were not with her, thought rather of her children, as though the catastrophe could happen only at some place where she would not be present.
The empress saw in Othomar so very much her own son that, in the intimacy of their morning conversations—for the crown-prince still paid his mother a short visit every morning—she was surprised not to find in him her own dread, but on the contrary all her own resignation, which was the reverse side of it. But since his marriage she had found him altogether changed, no longer, in these short moments of their private intercourse, complaining, hesitating, searching, but speaking calmly of what he must do, filled with an evident harmony that gave a restful assurance to his words, his gestures and even his actions. With this assurance he retained a quiet, dignified modesty: he did not put his views forward at all violently; he continued to possess that receptiveness for the views of others which had always been one of his most prominent and attractive qualities. He was undoubtedly old for his young years: any one who did not know better would have given him more than his twenty-three years, now that he was allowing his crisp beard to grow.... And yet, yet, especially in these troubled days, his old fears would often well up within him and he would remain sitting alone for minutes at a time, staring at a vague point in his room, listening to the murmurs of the future, as he had listened in that haunting night among his forefathers at Castel Vaza. He then felt that, suddenly, as with a garment, all his new resignation in life was slipping from him, falling from his shoulders. But he had learnt so to govern himself that nobody, not his father, not his mother, not even the crown-princess, noticed anything of this mental dizziness, which left him ice-cold in his short periods of solitude, doubting his right, full of strange, soft compassion for his people....
It was, actually, the old illness which thus, periodically, seethed in him again like an evil sap, flowing through his veins, enfeebling his nerves, crushing him internally, as though he would never be cured of it. But he grew accustomed to it, no longer felt despair because of it, even knew, during the few minutes that the malady lasted, that it would pass and afterwards regained that sense of harmony which above all constituted his resignation.
It was in these days of silent fermentation that there was talk of a marriage between Princess Thera and the Prince of Naples; nothing was yet decided between the two families, but the young prince was invited to Lipara to attend the great autumn manoeuvres. Shoots were arranged; different festivities followed one upon the other. Othomar had in these days to combat those sudden weaknesses more than ever: a strange feeling, a shivering, a mysterious terror remained with him and no longer left him, a terror which he dared not analyse, for fear of discovering motives which would cause him to lose his calmness entirely. There revived within him the recollection of the fact that shortly after his marriage he had dreamt a dream more or less similar to his former dream: the sinister capital filling with crape. It happened while he was still residing with his young wife at Castel Zanthos and he had attached no importance to it, because he considered that this second dream was only a shadow of the former one, only the remembrance of what had already happened and nothing more. But now, in these days of busy celebrations in honour of the prince who was visiting their court, with the ferment of popular discontent like a turbid, gloomy element beneath the surface brilliancy of all their imperial display, the memory of it revived and the terrors and shudders became more and more plainly defined in his imagination and at one moment he felt his former nervous weakness come over him to such an extent that he found an excuse to summon Professor Barzia from Altara and had a long interview with the specialist of which he did not even speak to the Duchess of Xara. When the professor had gone, Othomar felt relieved and strengthened; only the thought lingered within him that it was not right for a future sovereign to be so much under the influence of a stronger mind as he was under that of Barzia; and he proposed next time not to call in the professor's power of suggestion, but to cure himself, in the privacy of his own soul. This plan, to rely on his own strength in future, made him find himself again for good and all....
The day after his interview with Barzia, he spent the whole morning and afternoon in the company of the Prince of Naples, with whom he visited different places and, in so doing, displayed a gaiety and liveliness which were rarely witnessed in the Duke of Xara. The members of their suite were astonished at this radiant cheerfulness of the crown-prince, in whom they had grown used to perceiving always a strain of melancholy. That evening there was a great state-banquet at the Imperial. After dinner, the imperial family were to accompany their guest to the Opera, where a gala-performance was to take place and a famous tenor was to sing.
In these days, whenever the imperial family appeared in public, severe precautionary measures were taken under the guise of glittering display. A strong and close-packed escort of cuirassiers pranced round the carriages which drove that night to the great opera-house. The street at the side of the building containing the emperor's private entrance was closed off; a guard of honour lined the staircase; the secret police mingled with the expectant audience, which included all the smart society of the capital....
The imperial box, with its dark-violet draperies and gold tassels, was just over the stage of the colossal theatre. The first act was finished—they were playing Aïda—when the trumpet-blasts clanged out from the orchestra and the august personages appeared: the emperor, the empress, the Prince of Naples, the Duke and Duchess of Xara, Princess Thera. And their entry seemed to electrify the hitherto dull, waiting, nervously indifferent mood of the crowded house, as though, upon their appearance, the light in the lustres shone more brilliantly, the house blazed out with all the changeful flickerings of its jewels, all its flashing gilt, all the curiosity of the bright eyes that gazed at the imperial centre-group; as though the ladies' costumes suddenly blossomed out with one rustle of heavy silken fabrics, while the unfurled fans fluttered to and fro as though a breeze were blowing through many flowers in unstinted light....