Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07 (55 page)

As she re-crossed the
room she paused near De Richleau’s bed and, for a moment, stood regarding Ilona’s
photograph with a faint sneer on her small, pursed up mouth. Then, with calm
insolence, she remarked:

“You know, she thinks she
can keep her secrets from me. But she can’t. I wonder how Prince Boris would
like it if he knew that she had given you her photograph to keep beside your
bed?”

“What the devil do you
mean?” exclaimed the Duke angrily.

The little vixenish face
beneath the pile of flaxen hair broke into a cruel smile: then she laughed. “Oh,
didn’t you know? To cement the new treaty we are making with Bulgaria it has
been arranged that she shall marry him.”

That
night the Duke suffered the torments of the damned. He felt certain that Paula
had deliberately left her bag behind as an excuse to return and launch her
poisoned shaft, and was convinced that, however malicious her nature, she would
never have invented such a story. Before he had had time to collect his wits
and question her further, she had walked quickly from the room. But her
statement fitted in, both with what Count Tisza had said of the urgent
necessity of securing Bulgaria to the Triple Alliance, and with Ilona’s
inexplicable depression during her last two visits.

In vain De Richleau chid
himself for a fool. He told himself that he had always known that his affair
with Ilona could never be more than a summer idyll, and that at any time
arrangements might be made for her to marry suitably. But now that the blow had
fallen, such thoughts brought him not an iota of comfort, neither did the
knowledge that it was himself she loved, and not the twenty-year-old Prince
Boris. He was experienced enough to realize that jealousy was a selfish,
senseless, futile emotion, out of which no good could ever come; yet he was
harrowed by it as he had not been since its pangs had gnawed at him when he
learned in his ’teens that his first mistress was deceiving him.

Next day, the doctor
pronounced his leg sufficiently mended for him to get up and take a few steps
on it; so when Ilona came on Tuesday she found him sitting in an arm-chair.
Sárolta had not twisted her ankle badly and two days’ rest had enabled her to
resume her duties. As soon as she was settled in the window with Adam Grünne,
Ilona kissed the invalid and he drew her down beside him. By then he had had
time enough to absorb the shock and appreciate that she must be feeling as
badly about it as himself, so he took her hand and said gently:

“Why did you not tell me?”

Her blue eyes clouded
with distress. “So you know—about Boris?”

“Yes. Paula told me when
she came back for her bag, after your visit on Sunday.”

“The little beast!” Ilona
exclaimed. “I’ll dismiss her for this!”

“Get rid of her by all
means, dearest; but I suggest that you should find some other reason for doing
so, otherwise she may cause trouble. She noticed your photograph at my
bed-side, and inferred that she knew about us.”

Ilona shrugged. “The photograph
does not prove anything. Royalty often give photographs of themselves to their
personal friends. She can know nothing, and is only guessing.”

“Still, if you dismiss
her for this, it will confirm her impression.”

“That is true. Then I’ll
do as you suggest.”

“But why, my sweet, why
didn’t you tell me about your engagement?”

“It is not an
engagement—yet.”

“The project then. You
must have known of it some days ago.”

“I did.” Ilona sighed. “But
I knew it would make you miserable, and I thought that if I kept it to myself
for as long as possible we might continue to snatch a little happiness while we
may.”

“Is it—is it as good as
settled?” he asked with a tremor in his voice.

She nodded. “There seems
no likelihood of a hitch; and I’ll have no alternative but to go through with
it. Had some German or Italian Prince been proposed for me, I might have
declared my personal inclination so averse to him that they would have dropped
it. But I cannot do that in this case. A swift conclusion of the alliance with Bulgaria
is considered of such importance that my feelings are of no account whatever.
It is my duty to accept the situation with apparent pleasure. You see that,
Armand, don’t you? So please, please don’t make it harder for me.”

“I understand,” he
murmured. Then, after a moment, he said: “But if there can be no escape from
this wretched blow of fate, would it not make it easier for you to do your duty
if—if we end things now?”

Her arm was round his
shoulder and she quickly put her hand over his mouth. “No, please! My private
life remains my own, to do as I will with; at least until I am married.”

He kissed her hand and
drew it away. “As you will then, my sweet Princess. We’ll do our best to forget
this sword of Damocles that is suspended over our heads. But you have not told
me yet what Dr. Bruckner said about you yesterday.”

“Oh, Armand!” she stooped
and brushed his forehead with her lips. “I must ask your forgiveness about
that. I felt certain that any doctor would tell me that I ought to go back to
Ischl and rest again. In view of this other business nothing would now induce
me to leave Vienna, because that would mean leaving you. It seemed senseless to
consult Dr. Bruckner and then ignore his advice. So I sent to tell him that I
had changed my mind, and did not wish to see him.”

“But, Ilona dearest, that
was very wicked of you. Even if you refuse to take his advice for the time
being, you must see him. You must at least find out if there is anything
seriously wrong with you.”

“There is not. I’ve told
you so a score of times.”

“I wish to God I were as
certain of that as you seem to be. But I am far from it. If you will, count it
only as a stupid whim of mine. Just to please me, and set my mind at rest, I
beg you to see Bruckner before the end of the week.”

She shrugged. “Very well
then. I will. I promise.”

By Thursday De Richleau
was able to hobble about enough for him to be allowed out for the first time.
So, that afternoon, Ilona took him for a drive in the Prater, and she told him
that Dr. Bruckner was coming to examine her next day.

As the time was fast
approaching when the Duke would be fit to leave the nursing home, the problem
of how they could meet with any frequency in future was causing the lovers
considerable anxiety. There would no longer be any excuse for Ilona to play
ministering angel; it would be indiscreet for him to wait on her at the Palace
more than about once a week; and Court mourning continued to veto her
appearance at even small private entertainments.

It was dark-eyed, wicked
little Sárolta who solved their difficulty for them. A relative of hers, named
de Lazalo, had already achieved a considerable reputation as a painter. His
studio was in a private house that he occupied, just off the Schotten Ring, and
she was prepared to vouch for his discretion. She suggested that if Ilona
commissioned him to paint her portrait, she could arrange for sittings two or
three times a week, and the Duke could meet her there without anyone who might
make trouble being the wiser. Both of them were delighted, and she was asked to
arrange the matter so that the first sitting could take place early the
following week.

On Saturday Ilona called
for the Duke in her carriage again. Rather to his surprise, but to his immense
joy and relief, she told him at once that after Dr. Bruckner had examined her
on the previous day, he had confirmed the opinion of the Court physician. He
had, of course, prescribed country air and rest, but declared her malady
similar to that with which her grandmother had been inflicted. The symptoms of
intermittent fever and the exceptional delicacy of the throat muscles were the
same, and a quieter life was all that was needed to keep the attacks in check.

Dr Bruckner’s view was
certainly confirmed by the fact that since Court mourning had relieved Ilona of
her public functions she appeared very much better. But this afternoon she was
wearing an unusually heavy veil, and, after saying how glad he was to hear her
good news, the Duke asked her why she had suddenly chosen to conceal her lovely
features.

Leaning across the
carriage towards him, she lowered her voice: “I thought we would celebrate by
playing truant from the watching eyes of the servants for an hour or two. Adam
has arranged it all, and we are going out to Grinzing.”

Ten minutes later the
carriage pulled up in a shady avenue of the Park. On the opposite side of the
road another was waiting; but instead of having the Imperial Arms emblazoned on
its panels and liveried servants on its box, it was a shabby old Victoria
driven by a bottle-nosed cabby.

When the four of them had
transferred to the meaner vehicle, it set off north-west, out of the park and
along the south bank of the Danube for about three miles, then, leaving the
river, carried them up the hill through the vineyards to the old village that
had become an outer suburb of Vienna.

It was a very favourite
spot with the Viennese, who came by the hundreds on Sundays to spend the
afternoon and evening in its
Heuringer
,
as the wine-gardens there were called. Each autumn, nearly every Viennese went
there at least once, to try the new vintage; but all through the summer the
gardens were open for pleasure seekers to drink the previous year’s wine at
long, wooden tables, where they could picnic if they wished, dance and listen
to the band.

Adam Grünne told the
cabby to pull up at an archway, over which a bunch of green fir branches hung
from a pole—indicating that a fresh cask of wine had been broached there that
day—and they went inside. To most people it would have been just a pleasant little
outing, but to Ilona it was a terrific adventure, as she had never been
informally to such a place before or sat at a bare wooden table drinking out of
a thick tumbler. In the hot sunshine the fresh, slightly sharp wine tasted
delicious and the merriment of the ordinary patrons of the place was
infectious. Sárolta and Adam danced several times and, although De Richleau’s
leg made it impossible for him to dance with Ilona, he was amply compensated by
having her with him in such carefree surroundings.

For a Saturday afternoon
the place was fairly full, as it was the 18th of July and the summer holiday
season was just beginning. During the past ten days the crisis had died down.
The Austrian people were still angry, but it was now nearly three weeks since the
assassinations and their Government had taken no action, so the drum-banging
that had followed the terrible event at Sarajevo now looked like one more war
scare that might be relegated to the history books with Agadir.

All over the world people
were making their preparations to go to the beaches, the rivers and the
mountains on pleasure bent. The Isle of Wight would soon be full of Germans,
the Rhine of British trippers, the Belgian and Dutch
plages
of French families, and the German Baltic resorts of
Russians. Every capital would have its thousands of foreign sightseers and an
advance guard of them had already reached Vienna.

In the wine-garden De
Richleau could easily pick out Englishmen in Norfolk jackets, crop-headed
Germans and olive-skinned Italians, and a glance at any of them was enough to
show that war was the very last thing they were thinking about.

On the table at which
Ilona’s party were sitting a previous occupant had left a copy of the morning’s
paper and a head-line in it caught the Duke’s eye. It ran, ‘King George V
Reviews British Fleet’, and, drawing the paper towards him he remarked to Ilona
that it must have been a sight worth seeing.

Apparently Mr. Churchill
had not been content to parade only the ships of biggest and latest design in
honour of the Monarch. He had taken advantage of the summer training period of
the Naval Reserve, which had enabled all three fleets to be assembled. Thus, on
the one summer day he had concentrated incomparably the greatest assemblage of
naval power ever witnessed in the history of the world. The three fleets were
easily capable of destroying the navies of any other two powers together, and
so numerous was this armada that, steaming in close formation, line ahead, at
15 knots, it had taken more than six hours to pass in review before the Royal
yacht.

Recalling what Count
Tisza had said about the Kaiser’s rash encouragement of the Austrian
war-mongers, the Duke thought the gesture admirably timed and worthy of the
peace-loving but resolute Englishman who had planned it. The review had been
scheduled to take place long before Franz Ferdinand had been murdered, so it
was a purely domestic peace-time affair and a threat to no one: but if any
measure could give the hot-headed Kaiser pause, this tremendous demonstration
of naval might should do so.