by KJ Charles
We left the square at half past nine, with a mass of angry, insulted citizens behind us murmuring against their feckless king, and rode a little way out of town where we could speak.
“Well, it looks like the bottle worked,” de Gautet said. “I congratulate you, Bersonin.”
“We cannot yet be sure. They may simply have gone straight to Strelsau,” I observed. “Perhaps they did not trust Michael’s honour guard.”
“That would be a damn fool way to start a reign, by insulting the army,” Hentzau said. “What do you say, gentlemen? Shall we go and see?”
“Is that wise?” de Gautet asked.
“It’s natural enough,” I said. “We know where the king lay last night; we are concerned that his men did not arrive this morning. We go to discover if we can be of aid to His Majesty or His Majesty’s men, should some unforeseen disaster have occurred.”
“That’s good enough for me,” Hentzau said with a grin, and clapped his heels to his horse.
IT WAS NOT MUCH OF a lodge. I dare say I am too used to British imperial magnificence, or the riches of Indian princes; Ruritania’s trappings are decidedly less grand. This was a one-storey wooden bungalow, and it appeared deserted.
“Hi, the house!” Hentzau called, dismounting with his usual grace. “Hello?”
“The old woman should be here, at least,” de Gautet said with a frown. “Johann’s mother, what’s her name. Hello, Frau Holf?”
There was still no answer. The lodge door was shut, but in the way of the countryside, not locked. I turned the handle and went in.
The room thus revealed was a scene of debauchery. The table seemed to have been untouched since the previous night: it held a litter of dishes with the congealing remnants of a large meal, and four place settings, well used. The candles were burned to their sockets, and a truly startling number of empty bottles lay scattered around. A dusty wicker-covered flagon was among them, and Bersonin’s loving smile told me that this was the fatal bottle.
“It seems the king dined well,” he said.
“It seems nobody cleared up after him,” I added. “Where is the housekeeper?”
“Never mind that,” Hentzau said. “It was the king, von Tarlenheim, and Sapt here, is that not right?”
“That was the plan,” de Gautet agreed.
“So who the devil used the fourth knife and fork?”
As Hentzau spoke, I heard another sound, a faint noise as of a muffled cry. It came from a far door. I threw it open, drawing my sword, and revealed stone stairs going downward. The noise came again, and a grunt, and I ran down the stairs to see a cellar. There was a torch burning on the wall, two bodies lying on the floor, and a wide-eyed little serving-man staring at me.
“The duke’s murderers!” he bleated. “Help! Murder! Poison! Help!”
“Shut up,” I told him, and put my sword to his throat.
The others had been close behind me. Hentzau strode past to one of the recumbent bodies, crouched to see in the dim torchlight, and rapped out, “Detchard! Look here!”
I lowered my blade, nudging the servant over to Bersonin’s charge, and turned to see what Hentzau had found. And stood, and stared, because of all the damned unexpected things I have ever seen in my life, this was without doubt the damnedest.
The slumped man on the floor was the King of Ruritania.
“Good God almighty,” I said. “They just left him here?”
“It’s the king!” de Gautet said, catching up.
“What the hell. Is he dead?”
“Breathing, but out like a light,” Hentzau said. “He’s drenched; they must have been throwing water on him. He doesn’t look like he’ll wake soon, if ever. Well done, Bersonin. You put him into a coma, you stupid bastard.”
“No.” Bersonin knelt by the king, glared at him, slapped the slack face. “No! The cursed sot must have drunk the entire bottle. Damn him, damn him!”
“Where are his men?” de Gautet demanded. “Gone for a doctor?”
“You,” I said to the serving-man. “Talk. What happened? Where are Sapt and Tarlenheim?”
He spat at me. He had nerve, I’ll give him that.
There were urgent noises coming from the floor—from, I realised, the other body, which proved to be that of an old woman, tied up in the most peculiar way with silk handkerchiefs, including one stuffed in her mouth. Hentzau sliced away her bonds and helped her to a seated position, waving irritably when de Gautet began to question her. “For heaven’s sake, get the lady a drink first. Please, Mother, don’t distress yourself. What villain did this outrage to you?”
Rupert of Hentzau, solicitous protector of old age. It was enough to make a cat laugh.
We were in a wine cellar. De Gautet plucked a bottle from the shelves and Hentzau gave her drink, arm around her shoulders. “There, that’s better. You are Frau Holf, yes? Can you tell us what happened?”
“It was the king’s men,” the old lady said. “Drunks and villains, all of them. They found me listening to their talk this morning, as my sons asked me to do for the duke, and they hit me and tied me up, the cowardly swine. Afraid of an old woman.”
She sneered at the serving-man. He spat a vile epithet at her. I backhanded him across the face and requested she continue.
“Last night the king drank like the sot he is, and this morning he could not be awoken. They—Sapt, von Tarlenheim—conceived an imposture. They decided to present a fraud to the Almighty and the people.”
“A what?” I said.
“A fraud! A man who can impersonate the king!”
“That’s quite unlikely to work,” Hentzau said, with some understatement. “Rudolf has not been greatly in the country, but I still think people might notice.”
“No, sir, no,” Frau Holf said urgently. “He is as like to the king as two peas in a pod. They shaved his moustache off—I saw his face, and he is the very image. With my own eyes, I saw it. And he has gone to be crowned in Strelsau in the king’s place!”
“She’s mad,” Bersonin said.
“I don’t think so.” I had been watching the servant’s expression, the triumph under the fear. “You there, is it true? Do they have an impostor?”
“Go to hell. I tell you nothing, poisoners.”
“Who is this man?” demanded de Gautet. “The fourth diner, upstairs, was that him? Where the devil did he spring from?”
“They met him in the forest by chance,” the old woman said. “An Englishman, some bastard of the old king’s or a bastard’s son. I don’t know. The king called him cousin and jested of their resemblance.”
“A bastard, or a throwback,” Hentzau said. “A man with a look of the king, coming here to see his royal relative crowned, I suppose. Of course Rudolf would invite a doppelgänger to dinner. He loves his own face dearly.”
“He dined here,” I said slowly. “Slept here. They all woke to find the king in this state. And Rudolf wouldn’t wake up. Sapt and Tarlenheim will have been panicking, wondering if a dead-drunk king today would be a dead king by evening—”
“And then realised they had a double to hand,” Hentzau finished. His eyes held a look of unholy awe. “It’s magnificent. I take off my hat to them.”
“You stupid, poncing prick!” Bersonin snarled. “They’ll kill us all!”
“You deserve it,” the manservant said. “Murderers, villains, betraying your king, the true son, for your bastard duke—”
“Shut him up,” I told Bersonin, and turned back to Hentzau. “We need to think about this. I—”
The old woman gave a hoarse shriek, clapping her hands to her mouth, eyes widening. I swung round once more to see Bersonin let the serving-man’s body fall. His throat gaped, wide and red.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” I said, with I think pardonable annoyance. “What the devil did you do that for?”
“Silence,” he said. “Now and later. We can have no witnesses.”
The old woman shrank back fearfully. Hentzau patted her arm s
oothingly. “Please, don’t be afraid. You have no need to worry; the duke protects his own.”
“This is not a fit business for a woman,” I said, somewhat too late. “De Gautet, will you take this lady outside for some fresh air?” I waited till I heard footsteps and the outer door close. “Well, gentlemen, what now? We must assume Sapt and Tarlenheim will be back soon—”
“No, we must not,” Hentzau said. His eyes were bright. “If an impostor is being crowned in Strelsau, they will be flanking him every moment of the day. It’s their necks if anyone learns they’ve presented a fraud to the people, or the princess, or God. There would be rioting; they’d be lucky to live until the executioner got to them. They have to keep with the play-actor to make it work. That’s why the king is left here like lumber, under that fool’s guard.”
“They couldn’t send anyone to collect him,” I agreed slowly. “Far too dangerous. They had to leave him here. And they’ll come back to get him once the festivities are done—hoping, I suppose, that he will have slept it off and can take his rightful place with nobody noticing.”
“They must be mad,” Bersonin said.
I shrugged. “People see what they expect. If it’s a sufficient resemblance, if you did not know the king had a doppelgänger, if you expected to see Rudolf . . .”
“Detchard is right. People are idiots,” Hentzau said. “Although Flavia is not. Well, this will be interesting.”
“You may say so,” I said. “Right, there is no point avoiding the question. What the buggery are we to do with the king?”
Bersonin’s thin lipless smile widened. He took a step forwards, knife in hand, and came up short with my blade against his belly.
“Restrain yourself,” I said. “We’re still discussing this. There are two decisions to make. Whether we take him with us or leave him here, and whether we do it with him alive, or dead.”
“To leave him here alive is to resign the game, and we’d need to start running now,” Hentzau said. “If we kill him, Colonel Sapt still has a crowned king in Strelsau. And Sapt dearly loathes Duke Michael.”
“You think he’d put an impostor on the throne for good?” I asked.
“I don’t know. But we can hardly object that their man isn’t the real king if our only proof is that we killed the true Rudolf ourselves. Whereas if we take him . . .” Those demons danced in Hentzau’s eyes. “Sapt can have his false king on the throne; we’ll have a real ace in our pocket.”
“One who could tell tales of imprisonment in Zenda.”
“True. But Zenda has a deep moat that will hide a body, if it comes to that.”
“And in any case, we can’t leave him here,” I said. “If I were Sapt and found him dead I’d get rid of the impostor, set up a new murder scene, and accuse Michael.” And I had a good idea of Michael’s likely response, in that uncomfortable circumstance. He would cast the blame on his hired bravos and watch us all go to the block without remorse. “There’s no choice. We’ll take him with us, alive, and kill him if we must.” I sheathed my blade, and Hentzau and I heaved the unconscious body up the stairs. It never ceases to amaze me how heavy these are.
De Gautet and the old woman were nowhere to be seen. We set Bersonin to keep watch, and had got the drugged king onto the back of one of the horses and covered in a cloak by the time the Frenchman returned, alone.
“What did you do with her?” I asked.
“Dealt with it. She had heard too much.”
“Are you serious? You killed the old woman?” I said. “You— Oh Christ. Marvellous.”
Bersonin sneered. “There can be no witnesses. You are weak.”
“I’m surrounded by idiots,” Hentzau said. “She was Max and Johann’s mother, you bloody fool! How do you propose to explain that away back at the castle?”
“We’ll tell them she’s been packed off for safekeeping,” I said. “De Gautet, we’re borrowing your horse for the king. You and Bersonin clear up your mess. Properly, please, we don’t want anyone finding her. You can ride back together.”
“Maybe you can find someone else to murder on the way to keep your hands in,” Hentzau added nastily. “Come on, Detchard. His Majesty’s guard of honour can’t wait.”
CHAPTER NINE
We rode through the woods, Hentzau and I. We could not gallop, since we had to keep the horse that bore the unconscious king with us, and we had no rope to tie him to the beast’s back. He may have fallen off once or twice.
I should have liked to gallop; the forest was full of noises, and I expected a hunter, woodcutter, passing peasant, or, since this was Ruritania, small child in a red-hooded cloak at any moment. We had our burden covered as best we could, but the fact was, never did two men commit high treason quite as obviously as we, riding off with a half-dead monarch on his coronation day, leaving two dead witnesses behind us. There comes a point at which a trail of corpses becomes a problem instead of a solution.
We didn’t speak much. Hentzau said at one point, “Well, this is what you British call a lark,” and laughed, for all the world as though we rode for pleasure.
We skirted the castle—even Hentzau would not ride up the great approach with our burden—and he went off to get a larger cloth to cover the king while I waited. Still breathing, no sign of waking. I had wondered what we would do if he regained consciousness and began to shout or struggle, and had been planning the most convenient route to the border accordingly; it was a relief when Hentzau returned with a bit of sacking. We carried him into the Tower, where I as the stronger lugged the fellow into one of the many rooms with stout doors and locks, and Hentzau took the horses off to the stable.
“Well,” he said, once all that was done. “What now?”
“A message to Michael, I think. He must be concerned.”
“Ah, the great British understatement.” Hentzau checked the clock. “It’s past noon. The player-king will be riding through the streets of Strelsau, cheered or booed. Or perhaps the imposture is discovered and the city is rioting as we speak.”
“It must be a damned good likeness, or Sapt would not have dared attempt this.”
“It must. Though Rudolf has been much out of the country, has never attended Senate meetings, and has been as far as possible avoided by Flavia’s court,” Hentzau said. “And mostly, well, if you thought a king looked slightly different on the day of his coronation, yet his closest companions seemed unaware of a change, would you conclude it was a different man, or simply chalk it up to lack of sleep?”
“We’ll find out, I suppose. What message can we give Michael?”
“It must be carefully written, that’s for sure.” Hentzau gave it a moment’s thought, then seized paper and pen and dashed off a note, which he showed me.
My lord duke
Regarding the jewel which you recently purchased via our Belgian friend: By some strange chance, it seems you have a counterfeit on your hands. I am delighted to say all’s well and we have the original held safe at Zenda awaiting your pleasure.
Your humble servant
Rupert Hentzau
“All’s well?” I repeated, with some incredulity.
“Well enough for me.”
I decided not to argue; it would not be any use. “It will do; get it to him as fast as you may. I will close down the Tower. We want no servants here. Not a soul passes the drawbridge now but as commanded by Michael.”
Hentzau nodded. “And one more task for us both, I think?”
“What’s that?”
“Pack a bag. If this goes bad, we will both need to run as though the hounds of hell were at our heels.”
“Teach your grandmother to suck eggs,” I told him, in English. “I was running for my life when you were in the schoolroom cheeking your tutor.” And he doubtless had no idea what that might entail, or the ways by which a man might slide out from the grasp of the avenging law. “Do you know the Schwanthalerhöhe district of Munich? There is an inn called the Hundsstüberl on Kazmairstrasse. A message left t
here will reach me eventually, should you find yourself in trouble.”
“I have much to learn, I see.” He flipped me a cheery salute and went to send the letter. I returned to the king.
MICHAEL RETURNED TO the castle late that evening. He came to the Tower, with Krafstein and Lauengram at his heels, and a look of a man in the grip of a nerve-storm.
“What the devil has happened?” he barked. “What did your letter mean, all’s well? How is it well, and who in seven hells was that man who took the crown?”
“Oh, it all went ahead, did it?” Hentzau asked with an air of intelligent interest, and I thought Michael would strike him.
I took over, giving a brief explanation of what we had found in the lodge and what we had done, including the two deaths. Michael listened, face tense. I could not tell if he thought we had done right or not. He heard me out, then said only, “And you have my brother here.”
“Locked in. Still not awake.”
“He must have drunk the entire bottle,” Bersonin repeated for perhaps the seventh time.
Michael turned to him and de Gautet next to him. “What did you do with the servant’s body? Detchard said only that you buried the old woman.”
“We left him in the cellar where he fell,” de Gautet said as if that were obvious. Hentzau made a quiet noise of despair, and I pinched the bridge of my nose. I had not even thought to ask such an obvious question as did you hide both bodies?
Michael exhaled through set teeth. “Fools. Fools to kill and fools not to conceal your kill. Go and send someone to hide the damned body. My manservant Max would be best, and remember he is brother to Johann, so try to ensure he doesn’t find out you cut his mother’s throat.” He dismissed Bersonin and de Gautet with a gesture, and turned back to Hentzau and me. “And you pair. Did you reflect that you have committed me to open treason? Did it occur to you that you were kidnapping a king?”
