Another regiment left the Palace, to break ranks beyond the crowd, and add to the searchers. They marched to a muffled drum. As the sound reached him, the old warrior stirred. He had come to this, he who had planned, not for himself, but for his country. And because he was thinking clearly, in spite of his grief, he saw that his very ambition for the boy had been his undoing. In the alliance with Karnia he had given the Terrorists a scourge to flay the people to revolt.
Now he waited for the King’s death. Waited numbly. For, with the tolling of St. Stefan’s bell would rise the cry for the new King.
And there was no King.
In the little room where the Sisters kept their medicines, so useless now, Hedwig knelt at the Prie-dieu and prayed.
She tried to pray for her grandfather’s soul, but she could not. Her one cry was for Otto, that he be saved and brought back. In the study she had found the burntwood frame, and she held it hugged close to her with its broken-backed “F,” its tottering “W,” and wavering “O”, with its fat Cupids in sashes, and the places where an over-earnest small hand had slipped.
Hilda stood by the stand, and fingered the bottles. Her nose was swollen with crying, but she was stealthily removing corks and sniffing at the contents of the bottles with the automatic curiosity of the young.
The King roused again. “Mettlich?” he asked.
The elder Sister tiptoed to the door and opened it. The Council turned, dread on their faces. She placed a hand on the Chancellor’s shoulder.
“His Majesty has asked for you.”
When he looked up, dazed, she bent down and took his hand.