Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07 (57 page)

It was a question that in
May and early June he had asked himself a hundred times, but he had since
become so fully convinced that in this case the end justified the means, that
his voice hardened as he replied:

“If it be demeaning
oneself to strive to avert untold misery overtaking countless innocent people,
then I am guilty of it. What is more, I would demean myself again if by
ferreting out Austria’s secrets I could yet prevent a war.”

“Perhaps
—”
Her voice broke and she went on in a whisper:

“Perhaps you have already
endeavoured to do so. Since you left England you have spent far more time in
Vienna than in Belgrade.”

He shook his head
miserably. “Ilona, what of your love for me? Have you not sufficient faith in
me as a man to believe that I have acted only from good motives?”

“Yes, I love you,” she
murmured. “I cannot help myself in that. For the rest, I don’t know what to
think.”

For a moment they stared
at one another in unhappy silence. Then she drew herself up and said: “In view
of what you have told me, I realize the necessity for your immediate departure.
You have my permission to go.”

She was near to tears,
but pride held them back. Her voice held no quaver of sentiment, and her
attitude was entirely regal. To him there seemed no alternative but to accept
this formal dismissal. Overwhelmed with sorrow at this tragic ending to their
love affair, he bowed to her, turned on his heel, and limped slowly towards the
door.

He had barely reached it
when he heard a choking sob behind him, and her low cry: “Armand!”

Turning, he saw that
tears were now streaming down her face. She held out her arms. “Oh, Armand! We
must not part like this. Not—not without one last kiss.”

His game leg forgotten,
he re-crossed the studio in a few strides. Trembling with emotion, he caught
her to him.

“I—I simply can’t
understand why—why you should have done such a thing,” she sobbed. “Surely only
the most awful people are employed as spies? Ex-officers who have been
dismissed from the army in disgrace and can find no other way to earn a living;
petty criminals who are induced to do it by reduction of their sentences;
and—and prostitutes in garrison towns.”

He pressed her wet cheek
against his. “Darling, you are right about peace-time spies being mainly
recruited from the dregs of humanity; though in war many of them are honourable
and courageous people who risk their lives from entirely patriotic motives. As
far as I am concerned, I agreed to undertake this mission only with the
greatest reluctance. But once I had done so I realized its immense importance.
Surely you can see that had I been only a little more fortunate I might have
been in time to prevent the assassination of your cousin? Had I been able to do
that, this terrible crisis would never have arisen.”

She nodded, and smiled up
at him through her tears. “Yes, yes. That’s true. I hadn’t looked at it like
that.”

“Oh, thank God!” he
kissed her again. “Thank God you realize what I have been trying to do. I would
have eaten out my heart with misery had I been forced to leave you believing me
to be unworthy of your love.”

Her face clouded again. “But
what of Austria? While you have been here many of our leading men must have
talked freely in your presence. You must have heard many of our secrets, too.”

“I have; but none of any
great importance. And I swear to you that I have not used any of the knowledge
I have gained to Austria’s detriment.”

Once more her blue eyes
shone with love and trust. “Then I don’t care what nationality you are or what
you’ve done. I love you, and I shall never love anyone else. Stay with me,
Armand! Stay with me yet a little time. Serbia may give in. There may be no
war. Remain here at least until we know the worst, and it is absolutely
necessary for you to go.”

He shook his head. “No,
beloved. I beg you not to ask me.”

“Please, Armand! Please!
Remember what is in store for me. Once I am married memories of you are all I’ll
have to live on—the only thing I’ll have to comfort me for the rest of my life.”

“I cannot,” he sighed. “I
must go. Do you not see that if I remain and, even despite myself, learn more
of Austria’s intentions, should there be war between our countries it will be
my duty to tell what I know.”

“You tell me that you
have not passed on the knowledge that you have gained so far, so why should you
disclose anything more that you may learn in these next few days? Since you are
so honourable as to wish to go on that account, surely your love for me is
sufficient to put the seal of honour on your lips about everything you hear
until you leave Vienna.”

Suddenly he kissed her
violently again, broke the grasp of her hands about his neck, and exclaimed: “Ilona,
you are seeking to place me in an impossible position. You ask too much. I love
you desperately. I’ll love you till the day I die. But I’ve got to go. I must.
Good-bye.”

Swinging away from her,
he limped swiftly across the room. His heart was pounding and there was a mist
before his eyes. He felt as though he were leaving a part of himself behind,
but he had steeled himself to it. If he stayed the odds were all against his
learning anything that mattered about Austria’s military preparations unless he
went out of his way to do so. And if by chance he did, he considered that the
services he had already rendered would justify him in keeping his mouth shut.
It had never been suggested that he should attempt to ferret out Austria’s
secrets, so he could have stayed on for a day or two without risk of being
faced with the awful question of whether it was his duty to betray Ilona’s
trust in him. But Austria had her blank cheque from the Kaiser, and now that
she had sent out an ultimatum he felt that war was inescapable. To remain was
only to court a repetition of this agony of parting a few days hence. Torture
as the thought was to him that he might never see her again, he knew that he
had been wise for both of them in refusing her plea to delay his departure.

As he stumped towards the
door, dragging his injured leg a little, he was terribly tempted to look round
and snatch one last look at her to preserve in his memory. But he dared not do
so, knowing that he would weaken if he did.

Suddenly he heard her
running feet. She caught him when he was still only two-thirds of the way
across the room. Seizing him by the arm she swung him round, exclaiming:

“Armand! Armand! There is
something that I have not yet told you.”

He made a half-hearted
attempt to free his arm. “No, please,” he begged. “For pity’s sake! Let me go
now, and don’t prolong this agony.”

But she ignored his plea
and her words came pouring out in a breathless spate:

“Oh, Armand, I have
deceived you too. I have done worse! I may have harmed you. But I love you so
much that I could not find the strength to give you up. I’ve never loved anyone
before. I was never even kissed until you kissed me. Since that night at
Königstein I’ve only lived from hour to hour on the thought that you would soon
hold me in your arms again. I’ve been incredibly wicked. God will punish me for
it, I know. But I don’t mind that. I don’t mind anything if only you’ll stay
until we know that war with England is certain. I’ll be content with very
little. Just to be with you whenever we can manage it. Just to hold your hand,
to see you and hear your voice. Please,
please
forgive me and grant me that much.”

As she paused for breath,
he asked in amazement, “But what is there for me to forgive, my sweet? In what
way have you deceived me?”

Her lovely face was a
picture of grief and contrition as she sobbed: “I lied to you the other day.
And worse—much worse—I should never have let you kiss me. I didn’t see Dr.
Bruckner on Friday. It wasn’t necessary. I have known for months that my lungs
are affected. I am suffering from consumption.”

De
Richleau
raised his slender hands and took Ilona’s lovely, tear-stained
face between them. Before she could pull back her head, he leaned forward and
kissed her on the lips. Then he said:

“My poor Princess. I
feared this all the time. In fact, I felt almost certain of it.”

“You knew! And yet you
went on kissing me.” There was adoration in her eyes, but she added unhappily, “I
ought never to have let you. There is a risk that you might contract my
disease—may have done so already.”

He smiled. “I don’t think
you need worry about that. Anyway, I love you far too much to refrain from
making love to you whenever we are together; and now you’ve told me the truth
our future kisses are entirely my responsibility.”

“Oh darling! You mean you’ll
stay? You’re not going to leave me after all?”

“I ought to; but now I
know what I feared to be certain, I haven’t the heart. This serious illness on
top of the prospect of being forced into a marriage against your wish breaks
down my resolution. God knows I had no desire to go, and now it would be
callous of me to add to your distress by leaving before I positively must.”

“My marriage,” she
sighed; then gave a cynical laugh. “At least I derive a little consolation for
my illness when I think of that. I am counting on it to protect me from Prince
Boris’s attentions.”

“Could you not use it
then as an excuse to get the marriage called off?”

She shook her head. “When
royal unions are in question, no consideration is ever given to either party’s
health. Princesses have often had to marry men who had the most loathsome
diseases; and Princes been given wives with the taint of insanity.”

“Yes; that is terrible,
but true. And many people with your complaint have married and lived for years
without passing it on to their marriage partner. Besides, if only you will be
careful and have proper treatment, there is every hope that you may be cured.”

“Short of my going to a
sanatorium, all that can be done is being done already,” she assured him. “It
was kept a close secret, but Franz Ferdinand was afflicted with tuberculosis
when he was my age, and it was feared that he would die: but he got quite well
again. And I’m better—ever so much better than I was a month ago.”

“My sweet, I am
tremendously relieved to hear it. But all the same, you ought to go into a
sanatorium and be properly cured.”

“No. That I refuse to do.
My doctors tell me that, although it may take a little longer, I can be cured
without doing that. I should feel so depressed in such surroundings that they
would do me more harm than good. I’m certain of it. I’ll get well much more
quickly in a happy atmosphere.”

They had been alone
together for over half an hour, and felt that the time had come when they must
rejoin the others. So, after a last kiss, they returned to the garden. As a
small acknowledgment of de Lazalo’s tactful complaisance, Ilona asked him to
tea at the palace on Sunday. She asked De Richleau too; but they were to see
one another before that, as another sitting had been arranged for Saturday. Ten
minutes later they had separated, and the Duke was left with his thoughts a
chaotic whirl of Ilona—the ultimatum—espionage—mobilization and tuberculosis.

The following morning the
papers carried the full text of the ultimatum. It charged Serbia with culpable
tolerance of propaganda directed against the Dual Monarchy and accused Serbian
officers of planning the Sarajevo murders. There followed demands for the
dissolution of all nationalist societies; the arrest and trial of all officers
and officials that Austria-Hungary should name; that Austro-Hungarian delegates
should take part in an inquiry into the anti-Austrian movement and that Serbia
should accept the collaboration of Austro-Hungarian officials in its
suppression.

The terms were even
harsher than De Richleau had expected. They meant that any Serbian, against
whom the Austrians had a grudge, would have to stand his trial before a court
including a quota of Austrian judges, and that the Austrian police must be
given a free hand to carry out any investigations they chose in Serbia. In
short, the acceptance of the demands would put an end to Serbian independence.

Vienna went wild with
joy. At last this insolent, upstart regime in Belgrade was to be humbled and
its ignorant, brutish, murdering officers made to grovel in the dust. And if
Serbia dared to refuse the terms, then a million soldiers of the Empire would
cram them down her throat and teach her a still more bitter lesson. Later,
special editions published an earnest request from the Czar’s government that
the time limit of forty-eight hours given to Serbia should be extended to
permit of calm discussion, and a manifesto announcing that Russia could not
remain indifferent to the fate of Serbia. But the Austrian government refused
the request and the crowds proved blind to the warning note of the manifesto.
All day, and far into the night, bands of students and others roamed the
streets of the city, singing patriotic songs and clamouring for war.