"You will receive in this room, Eugen?" Aribert questioned him.
"Yes," was the answer, given pettishly. "Why not? Even if I have no proper retinue here, surely that is no reason why I should not hold audience in a proper manner?... Hans, you can go." The old valet promptly disappeared.
"Aribert," the Hereditary Prince continued, when they were alone in the chamber, "you think I am mad."
"My dear Eugen," said Prince Aribert, startled in spite of himself.
"Don"t be absurd."
"I say you think I am mad. You think that that attack of brain fever has left its permanent mark on me. Well, perhaps I am mad. Who can tell? G.o.d knows that I have been through enough lately to drive me mad."
Aribert made no reply. As a matter of strict fact, the thought had crossed his mind that Eugen"s brain had not yet recovered its normal tone and activity. This speech of his nephew"s, however, had the effect of immediately restoring his belief in the latter"s entire sanity. He felt convinced that if only he could regain his nephew"s confidence, the old brotherly confidence which had existed between them since the years when they played together as boys, all might yet be well. But at present there appeared to be no sign that Eugen meant to give his confidence to anyone.
The young Prince had come up out of the valley of the shadow of death, but some of the valley"s shadow had clung to him, and it seemed he was unable to dissipate it.
"By the way," said Eugen suddenly, "I must reward these Racksoles, I suppose. I am indeed grateful to them. If I gave the girl a bracelet, and the father a thousand guineas--how would that meet the case?"
"My dear Eugen!" exclaimed Aribert aghast. "A thousand guineas! Do you know that Theodore Racksole could buy up all Posen from end to end without making himself a pauper. A thousand guineas! You might as well offer him sixpence."
"Then what must I offer?"
"Nothing, except your thanks. Anything else would be an insult. These are no ordinary hotel people."
"Can"t I give the little girl a bracelet?" Prince Eugen gave a sinister laugh.
Aribert looked at him steadily. "No," he said.
"Why did you kiss her--that night?" asked Prince Eugen carelessly.
"Kiss whom?" said Aribert, blushing and angry, despite his most determined efforts to keep calm and unconcerned.
"The Racksole girl."
"When do you mean?"
"I mean," said Prince Eugen, "that night in Ostend when I was ill. You thought I was in a delirium. Perhaps I was. But somehow I remember that with extraordinary distinctness. I remember raising my head for a fraction of an instant, and just in that fraction of an instant you kissed her. Oh, Uncle Aribert!"
"Listen, Eugen, for G.o.d"s sake. I love Nella Racksole. I shall marry her."
"You!" There was a long pause, and then Eugen laughed. "Ah!" he said.
"They all talk like that to start with. I have talked like that myself, dear uncle; it sounds nice, and it means nothing."
"In this case it means everything, Eugen," said Aribert quietly. Some accent of determination in the latter"s tone made Eugen rather more serious.
"You can"t marry her," he said. "The Emperor won"t permit a morganatic marriage."
"The Emperor has nothing to do with the affair. I shall renounce my rights.
I shall become a plain citizen."
"In which case you will have no fortune to speak of."
"But my wife will have a fortune. Knowing the sacrifices which I shall have made in order to marry her, she will not hesitate to place that fortune in my hands for our mutual use," said Aribert stiffly.
"You will decidedly be rich," mused Eugen, as his ideas dwelt on Theodore Racksole"s reputed wealth. "But have you thought of this," he asked, and his mild eyes glowed again in a sort of madness. "Have you thought that I am unmarried, and might die at any moment, and then the throne will descend to you--to you, Aribert?"
"The throne will never descend to me, Eugen," said Aribert softly, "for you will live. You are thoroughly convalescent. You have nothing to fear."
"It is the next seven days that I fear," said Eugen.
"The next seven days! Why?"
"I do not know. But I fear them. If I can survive them--"
"Mr Sampson Levi, sire," Hans announced in a loud tone.
Chapter Twenty MR SAMPSON LEVI BIDS PRINCE EUGEN GOOD MORNING
PRINCE EUGEN started. "I will see him," he said, with a gesture to Hans as if to indicate that Mr Sampson Levi might enter at once.
"I beg one moment first," said Aribert, laying a hand gently on his nephew"s arm, and giving old Hans a glance which had the effect of precipitating that admirably trained servant through the doorway.
"What is it?" asked Prince Eugen crossly. "Why this sudden seriousness?
Don"t forget that I have an appointment with Mr Sampson Levi, and must not keep him waiting. Someone said that punctuality is the politeness of princes."
"Eugen," said Aribert, "I wish you to be as serious as I am. Why cannot we have faith in each other? I want to help you. I have helped you. You are my t.i.tular Sovereign; but on the other hand I have the honour to be your uncle:
I have the honour to be the same age as you, and to have been your companion from youth up. Give me your confidence. I thought you had given it me years ago, but I have lately discovered that you had your secrets, even then. And now, since your illness, you are still more secretive."
"What do you mean, Aribert?" said Eugen, in a tone which might have been either inimical or friendly. "What do you want to say?"
"Well, in the first place, I want to say that you will not succeed with the estimable Mr Sampson Levi."
"Shall I not?" said Eugen lightly. "How do you know what my business is with him?"
"Suffice it to say that I know. You will never get that million pounds out of him."
Prince Eugen gasped, and then swallowed his excitement. "Who has been talking? What million?" His eyes wandered uneasily round the room. "Ah!"
he said, pretending to laugh. "I see how it is. I have been chattering in my delirium. You mustn"t take any notice of that, Aribert. When one has a fever one"s ideas become grotesque and fanciful."
"You never talked in your delirium," Aribert replied; "at least not about yourself. I knew about this projected loan before I saw you in Ostend."
"Who told you?" demanded Eugen fiercely.
"Then you admit that you are trying to raise a loan?"