The Count made a gesture and a grimace of protest.
“This trick shall not serve you, Count, for long,” Ludovic said, checking his almost ungovernable anger in his anxiety for the Princess. “Let me tell you, the ladies you keep prisoners are of high rank, and you will detain them another hour at your peril.”
The Count smiled as resentfully indulgent. “Were the facts as you state them, I should be tempted to ask how ladies of high rank come to be travelling in this wild country in company with a pair of common swashbucklers, if the expression may be allowed me.”
This touched Ompertz, who had hitherto stood by chafing in silence. “You will pay for that, my sweet Count, on my own as well as this gentleman’s account, if ever I come within striking distance of you.”
“It is late,” Irromar observed, with his terrible coolness, “and chilly for listening to insane threats and bluster. I have already indulged you too long. I can only repeat that I have no knowledge of the ladies whom you say you seek. Now, Captain, I bid you good-night, and if I might venture to add a word of advice, it would be that you will do well to dissociate yourself forthwith from your two disreputable companions. You are a young man, and—what is strange in your father’s son—you seem easily gullible. Good-night.”
The window was closed with a bang, and the light disappeared. The three men turned and descended to one of the lower terraces, where they held a short consultation. Each was convinced that an attempt with that handful of men to force a way into the stronghold was not to be thought of, and Ludovic, gladly as he would have headed such a forlorn hope, was obliged to bow to its impracticability. The plan quickly decided on was that he and Udo Rollmar should ride back post-haste to Waldenthor, inform the Chancellor of what had happened, and return with a force sufficient to overcome and compel Count Irromar to surrender. Meanwhile the men already there would remain on the watch under the command of Ompertz.
No sooner was this plan settled, than the two, taking the freshest of the horses, started off on their long ride. Tedious as it was, especially to Ludovic’s impatience, the journey was by a much shorter route than that by which he had come. When once, after a couple of leagues’ rough riding, they gained the high road the way was smooth and direct enough. There was no comparison between their galloping progress and that of the heavy jolting coach in which the ill-fated elopement had been made. The day was yet young when the two drew bridle before the Chancellerie at Waldenthor, and Udo, ushering his companion into a salon, went to announce to his father the strange result of his quest.
Ludovic had taken, insensible of fatigue, but a few turns of the apartment in his restless impatience, when the Chancellor came in.
Rollmar’s greeting manner was a study, a curious blending of half-doubting deference and slightly contemptuous protest. But his keen scrutiny of the young man, a revising, as it were, under transformed circumstances, of a previous observation and opinion, seemed to satisfy him. His first words, as he bowed, lower than to an equal, yet not so profoundly as to an assured sovereign, were characteristic.
“And I, Adrian Rollmar, never even suspected it.”