Rudolf Rassendyll

“ There, in the bright moonlight, on the far side of the broad terrace, close by the line of tall trees that fringed its edge, we saw Rudolf Rassendyll pacing slowly up and down, with his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the arbiter of his fate, on her who was to make him a king or send him a fugitive from Strelsau.
"There he is, madame," said Sapt. "Safe enough!"
The Queen did not answer. Sapt said no more, and of the rest of us none spoke. We stood watching him as he struggled with his great issue: a greater surely has seldom fallen to the lot of any man born in a private station. ”

“ Rudolf was with the queen, my wife was resting, Bernenstein had sat down to a meal for which I could find no appetite. By an effort I freed myself from my fancies and tried to concentrate my brain on the facts of our position. We were ringed round with difficulties. To solve them was beyond my power; but I knew where my wish and longing lay. I had no desire to find means by which Rudolf Rassendyll should escape unknown from Strelsau; the king, although dead, be again in death the king, and the queen be left desolate on her mournful and solitary throne. ”

“ Times change for all of us. The roaring flood of youth goes by, and the stream of life sinks to a quiet flow. Sapt is an old man now; soon my sons will be grown up, men enough themselves to serve Queen Flavia. Yet the memory of Rudolf Rassendyll is fresh to me as on the day he died, and the vision of the death of Rupert of Hentzau dances often before my eyes. It may be that some day the whole story shall be told, and men shall judge of it for themselves. ”

“ Her eye had fallen on Rudolf Rassendyll. He knew her: she was no less a person than the wife of Helsing the Chancellor; his was the house at which the carriage had stopped. The trick that had served with the sergeant of police would not do now. She knew the King too well to believe that she could be mistaken about him; she was too much of a busybody to be content to pretend that she was mistaken. ”

“ It is women to whom women turn, and women whom women fear. "But Helga writes no letters," said the Queen.
"Why, no," said I, and I smiled a grim smile. Well, Rudolf Rassendyll had never wooed my wife.
She rose, saying:
"Come, let us go to the palace."
As she rose, Rischenheim made a quick impulsive step towards her.
"Well, my lord," said she, turning towards him, "will you too go with me?"
"Lieutenant von Bernenstein will take care——" I began. But I stopped. The slightest gesture of her hand silenced me.
"Will you go with me?" she asked Rischenheim again. ”

“ As a king Rudolf Rassendyll had died, as a king let him lie. As a king he lay in his palace at Strelsau, while the news of his murder at the hands of a confederate of Rupert of Hentzau went forth to startle and appall the world. At a mighty price our task had been made easy; many might have doubted the living, none questioned the dead ”

“ It is addressed to——"
Rischenheim paused.
"Well, my lord, to whom?"
"To a Mr. Rudolf Rassendyll."
Now Rudolf played his part well. He did not feign indifference, but allowed his voice to tremble with emotion as he stretched out his hand and said in a hoarse whisper:
"Give it me, give it me."
Rischenheim's eyes sparkled. His shot had told: the King's attention was his, the coats of the dogs were forgotten. Plainly he had stirred the suspicions and jealousy of the King.
"My cousin," he continued, "conceives it his duty to lay the letter before your Majesty. ”

“ The Queen had begun to listen before now; her eyes were fixed on Sapt, and she had stretched out one arm to him, as if imploring him to read her his riddle. But a few words had in truth declared his device plainly enough in all its simplicity. Rudolf Rassendyll was dead, his body burnt to a cinder, and the King was alive, whole, and on his throne in Strelsau. Thus had Sapt caught from James the servant the infection of his madness, and had fulfilled in action the strange imagination which the little man had unfolded to him in order to pass their idle hours at the lodge. ”

“ If all went well in the day that had now dawned, by the evening of it the letter would be destroyed, the Queen's peril past, and Rudolf once more far away from Strelsau. Then enough of the truth—no more—must be disclosed. Helsing would be told the story of Rudolf Rassendyll and persuaded to hold his tongue about the harum-scarum Englishman (we are ready to believe much of an Englishman) having been audacious enough again to play the King in Strelsau. The old Chancellor was a very good fellow, and I do not think that Rudolf did wrong in relying upon him. ”

“ Now a man who loiters on such a night, just because another ahead of him is fool enough to loiter, has a reason for his action other than what can be detected at first sight. So thought Rudolf Rassendyll, and his brain was busy with finding it out.
Then an idea seized him, and, forgetting the precautions that had hitherto served so well, he came to a sudden stop on the pavement, engrossed in deep thought. Was the man who dogged his steps Rupert himself? ”

“ Rupert of Hentzau had no thought of ghosts; the men he killed lay still where they fell, and slept where they were buried. And he had no wonder at the sight of Rudolf Rassendyll. It told him no more than that Rischenheim's errand had fallen out ill, at which he was not surprised, and that his old enemy was again in his path, at which (as I verily believe) he was more glad than sorry. As Rudolf entered, he had been half-way between window and table ”

“ Yet when I observe thus calmly and with good sense on the matter to the Constable of Zenda, he shakes his head and answers, “But Rudolf Rassendyll knew from the first that he would come again to Strelsau and engage young Rupert point to point. Else why did he practise with the foils so as to be a better swordsman the second time than he was the first? Mayn’t God do anything that Fritz von Tarlenheim can’t understand? a pretty notion, on my life!” ”

“ Rudolf looked at him with some surprise. Then speaking in a low voice, lest the Queen should hear and be distressed, he went on:
"You must prepare it, you know. Bring it here in a shell; only a few officials need see the face."
Sapt rose to his feet and stood before Mr. Rassendyll.
"The plan's a pretty one, but it breaks down at one point," said he in a strange voice, even harsher than his was wont to be. I was on fire with excitement, for I would have staked my life now that he had some strange tidings for us. "There is no body," said he. ”

“ Well, be it inspiration or be it delusion—and the difference stands often on a hair's breadth—I am glad that Rudolf had it. For if a man once grows rusty, it is everything short of impossible to put the fine polish on his skill again. Mr. Rassendyll had strength, will, coolness, and, of course, courage. None would have availed had not his eye been in perfect familiarity with its work and his hand obeyed it as readily as the bolt slips in a well-oiled groove. As the thing stood, the lithe agility and unmatched dash of young Rupert but just missed being too much for him. ”

“ Rassendyll, did not recognise who the visitor was; but he rightly conceived that he would serve his employer by tracking the steps of the tall man who made so mysterious an arrival and so surreptitious a departure from the suspected house. Accordingly, as Rudolf turned the corner and Helga left the window, a short thickset figure started cautiously out of the projecting shadow, and followed in Rudolf’s wake through the storm. The pair, tracker and tracked, met nobody, save here and there a police-constable keeping a most unwilling beat. ”

“ Yet Colonel Sapt did all as though he had given his assent, and watched the last hours in which his flight from Strelsau was possible go quickly by with more than equanimity. Why hurry Rudolf’s resolve? Every moment shut him closer in the trap of an inevitable choice. With every hour that he was called the king, it became more impossible for him to bear any other name all his days. Therefore Sapt let Mr. Rassendyll doubt and struggle, while he himself wrote his story and laid his long-headed plans. ”

“ Rudolf's eyes were closed and his head lay back against me.
"A man has shot the King," said I in bald stupid explanation.
All at once I found James, Mr. Rassendyll's servant, by me.
"I have sent for doctors, my lord," he said. "Come, let us carry him in."
He, Sapt, and I, lifted Rudolf and bore him across the gravel terrace and into the little saloon. We passed the Queen. She was leaning on Rischenheim's arm and held my wife's hand. We laid Rudolf down on a couch. Outside I heard Bernenstein say, "Pick up that fellow and carry him somewhere out of sight." ”

“ Rassendyll's wisdom in visiting Strelsau just now."
The king lit a cigarette.
"Well, Sapt?" said he questioningly.
"He mustn't go," growled the old fellow.
"Come, colonel, you mean that I should be in Mr. Rassendyll's debt if——"
"Oh, aye! wrap it up in the right way," said Sapt, hauling a great pipe out of his pocket.
"Enough, sire," said I. "I'll leave Ruritania to-day."
"Now, by thunder, you shan't and that's sans phrase, as Sapt likes it. For you shall dine with me to-night, happen what will afterward. Come, man, you don't meet a new relation every day!" ”

“ Then I, overcome by the strange thing, turned half-foolish by the bizarre mingling of comedy and impressiveness in Sapt's rendering of it, plucked him by the sleeve, and asked, with something between a laugh and a gasp:
"Who had that other corpse been, Constable?"
He turned his small keen eyes on me in persistent gravity and unflinching effrontery:
"A Mr. Rassendyll, a friend of the King's, who with his servant James was awaiting His Majesty's return from Strelsau. His servant here is ready to start for England to tell Mr. Rassendyll's relatives the news." ”

“ Rassendyll the plans that had been made, and, although she trembled at the danger that he must run in meeting Rupert of Hentzau, she had such love of him and such a trust in his powers that she seemed to doubt little of his success. But she began to reproach herself for having brought him into this peril by writing her letter. At this he took from his pocket the copy that Rischenheim had carried. He had found time to read it, and now before her eyes he kissed it.
“Had I as many lives as there are words, my queen,” he said softly, “for each word I would gladly give a life.” ”

“ Then they made their piles of wood, pouring the store of oil over them and setting bottles of spirits near, that the flames, having cracked the bottles, might gain fresh fuel. To Sapt it seemed now as if they played some foolish game that was to end with the playing, now as if they obeyed some mysterious power which kept its great purpose hidden from the instruments. Mr. Rassendyll's servant moved and arranged and ordered all as deftly as he folded his master's clothes or stropped his master's razor. ”

“ M. Radisson no more takes off his hat than a king's ambassador, but he waits for La Chesnaye and Forêt to uncover. The merchant strums on the table and glares at the marquis, and the marquis looks at the skylight, waiting for the merchant; and the end of it is M. Radisson must give Godefroy the wink, who knocks both their hats off at once, explaining that a landsman can ill keep his legs on the sea, and the sea is no respecter of persons. Once, at the end of his byplay between the two young fire-eaters, the sea lurched in earnest, a mighty pitch that threw tipstaff sprawling across the table. ”

“ At that, Chouart Groseillers shivered a bottle of wine against the flag-pole. Drums beat, fifes shrieked as for battle, and lusty cheers for the king and Sieur Radisson rang and echoed and re-echoed from our crews. Three times did Allemand beat his drum and three times did we cheer. Then Pierre Radisson raised his sword. Every man dropped to knee. Catholics and Protestants, Calvinists and infidels, and riff-raff adventurers who had no religion but what they swore by, bowed their heads to the solemn thanks which Pierre Radisson uttered for safe deliverance from perilous voyage. ”

“ Every man unconsciously took to throwing his pistol under the table, flinging sword-belt down and hiding daggers below benches. Of a sudden, the surprise went to their heads.
"Gentlemen," began M. Radisson.
But the fellows would have none of his grand speeches. With a cheer that set the rafters ringing, they were on their feet; and to Mistress Hortense's face came a look that does more for the making of men than all New England's laws or my uncle's blasphemy boxes or King Charles's dragoons. You ask what that look was? Go to, with your teasings! A lover is not to be asked his whys! ”

“ At last he awoke, as he heard a loud knock at his door.
"Eh, open, will you?" cried Nastasia. "Don't lie there like a dog.
It's eleven o'clock."
"Perhaps he is not in," said a man's voice.
"The porter's voice. What does he want?" Raskolnikoff rose, and sat on the couch listening. His heart throbbed violently.
"Who has bolted the door then?" exclaimed the servant. "Open, will you?"
"All must be discovered?" He rose a little and undid the bolt, and fell back again on his bed. ”

“ I mind under the archway that spanned little Whitehall Street M. Radisson dismissed our coachman.
"How shall we bring up the matter of Hortense?" I asked.
"Trust me," said Radisson. "The gods of chance!"
"Will you petition the king direct?"
"Egad—no! Never petition a selfish man direct, or you'll get a No! Bring him round to the generous, so that he may take all credit for it himself! Do you hold back among the on-lookers till I've told our story o' the north! 'Tis not a state occasion! Egad, there'll be court wenches aplenty ready to take up with a likely looking man! ”