“I will forbid my servants to attend you,” cried the Prince, suddenly becoming violent.
“Let your Highness be at ease about that,” said Roger Egremont, respectfully, to the Princess. “I am an excellent coachman, and will drive your Highness’s coach and six to Paris with pleasure.”
“And I will be your Highness’s footman on this journey,” added Berwick. “I would recommend your Highness to make ready for your departure, for it is now near daybreak, and we should leave with the dawn. I will remain with you, to protect you, while you make your preparations for leaving—and Mr. Egremont will see that the coach is made ready immediately.”
“I go to order the coach,” said Roger. “Luckily, we are here as we arrived from Mondberg, and my horse-pistol is in the holster of my saddle. A horse-pistol is a powerful persuader under some circumstances. I beg your Highness will excuse me.”
The Princess nodded graciously, and Roger went out backward. As he reached the door, he paused, and shaking his fist at the Prince, at Sir Hugo, and at the Countess Bertha, he bawled,—
“O generation of vipers! infernal scoundrels that you are! As for you, Hugo Stein, remember your life is forfeit to me a thousand times over—and prepare you to defend it!”
“I will,” replied Hugo. He was not quite so happy as he had been five minutes before,—his scheme was not working out so well; but he said boldly, “And make you ready, Roger Egremont, to defend your own life; for by God! you will need to.”
“I shall,” replied Roger, “and know you, I fear you not by night or day, with arms or without, on foot or on horseback. And I say to all of you—may God’s vengeance alight on you, and may He in His goodness make me the instrument of it!”
And as he shouted out the words in his rich, full, resonant voice, came through the open door a burst of triumphant music, louder than any that had gone before, as if in applause of Roger Egremont’s words.
He ran at full speed out of the palace, on to the terrace, where a sleepy groom was walking Merrylegs and Berwick’s horse up and down. The air was keen and fresh; the sky was like a great dome of mother-of-pearl, with glints of color radiating from the east where a rosy flush heralded the dawn. Through the open windows came still the long, drawn sweetness of the violins, and the candles flickered palely in the coming of the new day.