Ferdinand waved his hand with a gesture of dismissal. “We will see you again, Count; you understand?” he said significantly, as he rose and walked away.
CHAPTER XXIX
FERDINAND’S SECOND VISITOR
THE man to whom Ferdinand turned in his perplexity was one Eugen Morvan. It was he who had practically set him on the throne, since he had been the instigator of the course of intrigue which had rendered possible the coup by which the crown had been seized. A fat, sensual looking man of five and forty, one who, to the Church’s certain advantage, had stopped just short of becoming a priest, and, having thrown aside his deacon’s cassock, had, by devious paths, found his way to the Court, there, by luck, assurance, an easy-going philosophy and assiduous flattery, to attach himself to the person and fortunes of the Prince who stood next but one to the throne.
That his patron should be so nearly a power, and yet be none, was of itself enough to make it certain that the intriguing, insinuating spirit at his elbow would never rest from prompting him to amend the accident of birth. And when the idea had been accepted and the scheme launched, Morvan had proved that his lazy, self-indulgent exterior masked a spirit of daring conception and resource. He was ambitious, too, from, of course, the most material of worldly considerations. He had a bad man’s lust for power; power for evil, for selfish ends, for the gratification of every whim, from revenge to appetite. To have attempted to attach himself to Ludwig would have been absolutely futile. Bad men are keenly sensitive to their affinities and their antipathies. Ludwig would never have looked at that unctuous, knavish face but to order it from his court. Morvan knew that well, and hated him accordingly. Besides, to the rightful heir to the throne he could have been of no possible use. There could be no call there for the intriguing arts by which he sought to make himself indispensable. But when once he had Ferdinand committed to the scheme of usurpation—which, by an unlooked-for piece of luck, Ludwig’s mysterious absence so strangely favoured—that Prince was in his power; bound to him body and soul. Ferdinand dared not go back when the evil genius at his side urged him forward, and the result had indeed justified the confidence of the daring pilot who had seized the helm of his fortune.
“He is found.”
Morvan had guessed it already. “I was sure of it, sire. Nothing else could have brought that ruffian to Court.”
Briefly, not without a sign of agitation, Ferdinand told what he had heard. It was the way of his shrewd adviser never to make light of dangers, however insignificant, lest he should lose the credit of surmounting them. So his face was grave as he listened.
“So the crisis has come at last,” he observed, with an air of confidence in his ability to meet it. “The time for final action has arrived. It is well. You have acted wisely, sire, in caging the wild beast. What is to be the next move?”
Morvan was far too shrewd to force his advice gratuitously upon his patron, knowing if he held back his counsel it would be surely demanded. And when he gave it, it was cleverly done with an air of merely amplifying his master’s suggestions and putting them into practical shape.
“It is on that,” Ferdinand answered, “that I must have your advice. We must tread warily now.”