An Uncrowned King: A Romance of High Politics

by Sydney C. Grier

“Your Highness is most welcome,” said the Premier. “You will not, I trust, involve yourself in any difficulty with Germany upon our account?”

“If the telegraph wires are cut, no remonstrance can reach me,” said the Prince, drily.

“In that case,” said M. Drakovics, “I may give utterance to my most earnest wish under the circumstances. I know you will agree with me, gentlemen, that we cannot do better than invite his Serene Highness to direct the military operations for the recovery of the capital. Our own Commander-in-Chief has betrayed his trust, and the officer next in seniority to him is a protégé of his, the commandant of Tatarjé. Prince Otto Georg of Schwarzwald-Molzau is the pupil of Moltke, and has had a larger experience of war than any of us can boast. If you concur in my suggestion, I will draw up a formal invitation to him to take the command of the army before I start on my journey.”

The officers made no objection to the appointment, and indeed, in the helpless condition to which they were reduced by the cutting of the telegraph wires, and their ignorance of the state of feeling in the other garrisons, to say nothing of the treachery of their natural leader, they were only too glad to feel a strong hand at the helm. Moreover, they had feared that M. Drakovics might be about to install himself as Commander-in-Chief, and it was a relief to their minds to obtain a soldier instead. Prince Otto Georg’s appointment was therefore received with acclamations, and when M. Drakovics departed on his journey, he left him firmly established in his post.

To describe in any detail the doings of the next three days would be a task both long and dreary. As soon as it was light on the first morning, an officer, bearing a flag of truce, was despatched to the city to ask for an assurance of the safety of the King, but he was fired upon from the gate, and obliged to return without gaining any information. News on other points was, however, obtained in various ways. In spite of the absence of telegraphic communication, Prince Otto Georg received constant intelligence through messengers. From M. Drakovics’s confidential clerk in Bellaviste he learned, by means of a cipher letter carried by a fisherman, that nothing had been seen or heard of Caerleon, but that King Peter Franza was not among the returned exiles, having preferred to remain at Nice in trustful quietness while his faithful subjects regained his throne for him. General Sertchaieff’s brother, the late Premier, was, however, one of those who had returned, and was now at the head of affairs. He had taken possession of the Government offices, and had levied a certain sum of money from the town—a measure which had called forth much opposition from the people, although the city guard enforced the payment of the impost. News arrived also from M. Drakovics. The garrison of Feodoratz he found to be staunchly Carlinist, while that of Tatarjé was divided, and the division was carried to such a point that the detachment which sympathised with the house of Franza had already set out for Bellaviste with the commandant in order to join the insurgents. This was Prince Otto Georg’s opportunity. Posting his men in a wood on the road by which the mutineers were expected to arrive, he attacked them unawares as they straggled along in a disorderly crowd, captured the field-artillery they were bringing with them, and left only a few scattered fugitives to carry the news to Bellaviste.

This victory proved to possess a double value for the Carlinists. Not only did it deprive the rebels of the reinforcement they had been anxiously expecting, but the news of the battle, spreading with extraordinary rapidity from village to village, came in the nick of time to secure the allegiance of the people, who were bewildered by the sudden rush of events. The country gentlemen and their mountain clans required no such earnest of the eventual success of the Carlinist cause; but the bulk of the dwellers in the more settled districts were accustomed by long tradition to side with the party in power, and it is undoubtedly startling to retire to rest one night knowing that you have an idolised King on the throne, and a determined Minister exercising all the functions of government, and to find on awaking in the morning that your King has probably been murdered, and certainly been dethroned, while your Premier is stumping the country for support. In such a case it was difficult for the obedient partisans of “Government” to know exactly who the Government was, and Prince Otto Georg’s victory came just when it was needed to quiet their minds. He took his prizes back in triumph to the barracks, and the whole of the next day was spent in maturing and preparing with their aid his plan of attack on the city. At night M. Drakovics returned from his tour of the outlying districts, bringing with him a military contingent drawn from the faithful portion of the Tatarjé garrison, and an irregular force of mountain chiefs and their retainers.

“I half hoped that your Highness might have retaken the city by this time,” he said to Prince Otto Georg.

“I never strike until I am ready,” replied the Prince, and M. Drakovics deferred to his wider experience, nor did he, when the plan of attack had been explained to him, regret that he had done so.

The next morning—the third after the seizure of the palace—broke dull and hazy, a fact which Prince Otto Georg hailed with delight as of the greatest moment to his scheme. During the two days that he had held office he had stopped all the vessels which came up the river, so that he had now under the guns of the barracks a miniature fleet of small steamers and cargo-boats, from which he selected a certain number to convey the greater portion of the artillery which he had captured from the Tatarjé rebels. Each vessel mounted one gun, and carried a small number of soldiers, sufficient merely to work it and to defend the ship. Before it was light these ships were now towed up the river in perfect silence by boats with muffled oars, and anchored close under the batteries, the fire from which would, owing to this precaution, pass harmlessly overhead. The batteries had been constructed to command the deep channel in which alone warships could anchor, and their guns were hopelessly unable to reach the small river-steamers with their light draught of water. Secured in this way against interference from above, the vessels opened fire on the town, and maintained their position with ease, even beating off successfully a boat-expedition led against them by Louis O’Malachy. Although the effect of the firing was small, since Prince Otto Georg’s object was to frighten rather than hurt, it was evident that the rebels regarded the situation as serious, for they left the batteries which they had been engaged in constructing in other parts of the town, and began to throw one up at the end of M. Drakovics’s garden, with the intention of rendering the position of the vessels untenable. This gave the Prince the opportunity for which he had been waiting. He had very soon perceived that when the rebels had effected their great coup, and had telegraphed to the various European capitals the news of the revolution (as M. Drakovics informed him had certainly been done), and then cut the wires, they had worked themselves at least as much harm as their opponents. If they had managed to capture M. Drakovics as they had intended, all would have been well; but they had been baulked in this, and he, once outside the limited zone in which the wires were cut, had used the telegraph to call together his adherents from all parts of the country, while they had no means either of gaining information or of sending orders to their more distant supporters. Disappointed of the help they had expected from Tatarjé, their action would necessarily be partial and undecided, since they had no idea of the extent to which their views found support outside the capital, although it was evident that the country had not risen in their favour as they had anticipated. It was true that they had made an attempt at a cavalry reconnaissance the day before; but the troopers had been driven back into the town in disorder with the help of the guns taken from the Tatarjé contingent, and at the present moment every one was far too much engrossed by the attack on the river-face to think about obtaining information on the land side.

Once assured that his naval demonstration was successful, Prince Otto Georg led the main body of his little army, together with two guns which he had reserved for this purpose, round to the other side of the city, remote alike from the river and the Carlino barracks. By taking advantage of every scrap of cover afforded by the woods and rising ground, he succeeded in performing this manœuvre without its being perceived by the townspeople, the attention of whose leaders was completely occupied by the attack on the river-face. Bringing his guns into position on the edge of a wood, he formed up his men in readiness to advance, and opened fire on the gate nearest him, following up the first effective shot by an immediate rush forward. The small guns mounted on the wall, and served by half-hearted townsmen, who were by no means anxious to provoke an artillery fire which would probably bring their houses about their ears, had little result in checking the advance of the besiegers, and before the rebel leaders could be recalled from their futile labours on the other side of the city, the gate was down and the Carlinists were pouring in.