IV
Alexandra pressed her hand on the table in a flutter of nerves, to which she was little accustomed. But they had vibrated painfully more than once during the dinner, although, with all her experience of courts, she had rarely been present at so magnificent a scene. The immense Throne Room, or Great Hall of Ceremonies, of perfectly simulated yellow marble, relieved only by white wood heavily incrusted with yellow bronze, seemed to quiver in its flood of amber light. The three chandeliers were huge inverted stacks of golden leaves, with no false note of crystal. The few women present were superbly dressed, and covered from crown to waist with the jewels of centuries, but they made an indifferent showing beside the barbarous magnificence of the Hungarian magnates. Every other man at the table, except the cardinals, was in uniform: the King, the Archdukes, and the Emperor’s suite, in the Prussian;the few members of his household whom Franz Joseph had ventured to bring to the jealous capital of his most uncertain possession, and the Grand Stewards of the Archdukes, wore an Austrian uniform; and the Ambassadors were in fullest dress. But it was evident that the fiery independent spirit of the great nobles of Hungary recognized no uniform except that of a glorious extravagance. Their fancy ran riot in color, in textile, in form. But whether in thick brocade, delicate or gorgeous of hue, in cloth of gold or silver, in white satin fitting like a cuirass and studded with jewels, or in silk so heavily embroidered with gold that it creaked like an armor; whether the long velvet cloak, trimmed and lined with priceless fur, its embroideries representing years of labor, its buttons and chains of big uncut jewels, was worn, or used carelessly as a background, there was nothing in Europe, not even in Russia, to compare with them. The headpieces of fur, the plume fastened with a jewelled rosette, were under their chairs, their high boots and silken small-clothes were likewise eclipsed for the hour, but there was more than enough of them to make the great golden room look like a page of old Hungarian history. So their ancestors had sat at Árpád’s table a thousand years ago. The hair of these men might be shorter, but it is doubtful if they varied in another external detail. Their faces were mobile, excitable, sometimes very clever. A few looked like men of the great world, although in that costume it was difficult to look like anything but the feudal lord ready on an instant’s notice to blow the trumpet in his villages and lead his bondsmen to battle.
As their fiery glances wandered from the Archduchess Ranata Theresia to the German Emperor, from the beautiful woman who reminded them of their lost Rudolf to the dashing young monarch they so passionately admired,a man after their own indomitable Hungarian hearts, they seemed to create an atmosphere of uneasiness, of premonition. Alexandra could imagine their swift transition from extravagant courtesy towards their aged King into the wildest excitement of which the modern man is capable; and endeavored to hope that William would behave himself. The young magnate on her right, Count Zrinyi, was evidently a very excitable person. He had from various causes approached the verge of explosion several times. Never having met anything like this cool American girl, he had fallen madly in love with her; the blood flew to and from his face, his jewelled armor creaked, and twice he dashed the tears from his eyes. Alexandra would have imagined herself in one of the Nights of Arabia had it not been for the intervals of rational conversation, when, seeing himself mirrored in the clear eyes beside him, and fancying, as many a wiser man has done, that it was a kindred soul he saw, he had talked of the grievances of the Hungarians and their determination to have their own way in their own country. At present they were engaged in the extermination of the hated German language and the universal substitution of the Magyar. It mattered nothing that less than half the population of their country spoke Hungarian, that the spirit of Roumania still hovered over the land beyond the Theiss, that there were whole villages where the language was never heard, and that Croatia and Slavonia hated them; the intense national pride and spirit which had endured for a thousand years, weathering every conquest, every humiliation, as ardent under the two centuries of Turkish rule as during the climax of their glory under Matthias Corvinus, had gathered fuller strength since the Revolution of ’48; and the determination was growing daily to give emphasis in every possible way to the individualityof this most individual of European states. Let those pitch their tents in Hungary who would, but they must learn and use the Hungarian language or feel themselves the aliens they were—Austrian officers not excepted.
Alexandra yielded to an impulse, not so much of coquetry as of curiosity; she expressed approval of his patriotism in the beautiful Magyar tongue. She had avoided German instinctively, and they had talked in English—like most of his class he was accomplished in many languages. For the moment she regretted her experiment. He trembled violently and turned white. It was then that he shed his first tear.
“You arenotcruel!” he murmured. “You have enraptured me! How kind—how wonderful. It is said to be the most difficult of tongues. Did you learn a few words, perhaps, before coming to Hungary, knowing our greatest weakness—”
“Dear me, no. I studied Hungarian, as one of many languages, with the Archduchess. She studied it as a matter of course.”
“That is a very practical explanation,” he said sulkily. “If I had had time to think I should have known. Queen Elizabeth,” he looked as if he would have raised his plumed and jewelledkalpaghad it not been under his chair, “bewitched Hungary upon her first visit by speaking perfectly the Magyar language. She took a great fancy to a young Hungarian girl and invited her to become a maid of honor, but when she discovered that she had been educated in Paris and had almost forgotten her native language she sent her home to learn it, and would not receive her into her household again until she was proficient. We have never forgotten that. And Rudolf! itwashis language—we refused to believe that he knew how to speak German.”
“Do you regret Rudolf?” asked Alexandra, in the tone she might have used to demand his opinion of the soft music in the gallery. Again she had touched powder with her wicked torch.
“Regret Rudolf?—Rudolf?” He took himself in hand and proceeded more calmly in a moment. “Mademoiselle, I regret the Crown Prince, like many others, for personal reasons, and, like the whole of my country, like all Europe, in fact, for grave political reasons. He was so warm, so genial, so fascinating—the best of good fellows, the most simple and unostentatious of princes, and, what all princes are not—we have one at this table, mademoiselle—a gentleman to the core. He loved Hungary as much as Hungary loved him. Had he lived there would be no straining at the bit now; we should be content to wait. Had he lived, there would be in Europe to-day no uneasy anticipation of our poor old King’s death. And not only could Rudolf make himself beloved by everybody, but there have been few better brains born to thrones—or in spheres where brains are more abundant. He would have sown his wild oats, poor chap!—and have made a great ruler. Then our guest would have had a rival worthy of his mettle. Now he has none.” With one of his abrupt transitions he continued: “And such tact! In all the years that he came to us and held his little court here in Buda, or was a mere sportsman in his hunting-castle, he never made a mistake. Do you know that the King actually has his drinking-water brought from Vienna? And the very food we are eating—and the cooks! Bah!—I’ll eat no more. It is your fault, mademoiselle, that I did not think of it sooner. I never go to Vienna. When he is here—our King—I honor him, for he is old and good and kind—now!—but you will acknowledge, mademoiselle, that he insults us unnecessarily when he brings with himwater and meat, vegetables, fruits, to this land flowing with milk and honey.”
“Well, perhaps he does not like milk and honey. I detest both myself. And while I am willing to admit that your language is the most beautiful in the world—a union of velvet and steel, of music and running water and of the sonorousness of distant thunder—yet, my dear Count, still will I give the palm to Vienna for water. It always tastes and sparkles as if it were gushing still from its springs in the mountains, and I am delighted that the Emp—King brings it along.”
The Hungarian looked at her speculatively. He was not a fool, and recognized her difference from the women to whom he was accustomed, although he did not pretend to understand her. The mystery, and her curious treatment of his love-making, made him more thoughtful than usual. He was about to feel his way towards a new channel of attack when his eyes encountered the heavy black-framed visage of the King’s heir, and his ardent brain leaped in a new direction.
“Do you know what that man has done to-night?” he murmured furiously. “He has left his wife at the station in a railway carriage, while he dines here as the guest of the King! I only pretend to touch his hand! Do you call that a man—to make a woman his wife, the mother of his children, and treat her like his mistress? If he had not the courage to renounce his pretensions to the throne and live like a gentleman, why did he marry her? Would such a thing be done in your great country?”
“Oh, well, we do not have morganatic marriages,” said Alexandra soothingly. “It certainly was inconsistent of him to marry her.”
“It is very awkward for us. We acknowledge no difference between husband and wife in Hungary. Ifthat man ever does come to the throne, his wife will be our Queen—”
“Rise!” said Alexandra, “the King is on his feet.”
And now the King had made his pleasant toast to the illustrious guest, the room had rung with enthusiastic “Élyens,” and the German Emperor was facing his audience in a stillness so profound that others besides Alexandra longed to have him begin a speech which all knew, from the defiant almost impish light in his eyes, was to be something more than the voluble rhetoric commonly heard at royal tables. He had been in the highest spirits all the evening, joking with the King, at whose right he sat in the middle of the long table, and with every one else in his neighborhood, temporarily charming even his avowed enemy, the Archduchess Ranata Theresia, who sat on his right. In the light-blue and white uniform of a general of the Austro-Hungarian army, his breast covered with orders, he had never looked handsomer; and in the atmosphere of approval that he loved he was ready—everybody felt who knew him—to do and dare anything. But the most expectant were unprepared for his actual performance.
He began at last, turning with deep respect to the King, and a slight excitement was perceptible in his strident tones.
“It is with a feeling of the deepest gratitude that I receive the hearty welcome of your Majesty. Thanks to the invitation of your Majesty, I have been able to visit this splendid town, whose grand reception nearly overwhelmed me.” He paused as if again overcome by the memory, then launched his first thunderbolt at the tempestuous hearts of a people who but half a century before had almost succeeded in wresting their great kingdom from the monarch whose guests they were to-night—a people whose fathers had died cursing thename of Hapsburg, and petitioning Heaven for the success of the Hungarian arms.
“We are following at home,” announced the German Emperor, “withsympathetic interestthe story of the knightly Hungarians,whose patriotism has become proverbial, and who in a glorious past did not hesitate to sacrifice their blood—for the holy cross,” he added with pious haste. “Names like Zrinyi inspire the hearts of German youths to the present day. We witnessed withsympathetic admirationthe festival of the thousandth birthday, which the Hungarians, surrounding their beloved King, celebrated with such astounding pomp. The proud architectural works of your great city give evidence of her artistic spirit, and the bursting of the bonds of the Iron Gates has opened a new way for commerce, andhas ranged Hungary as an equal among the great and the most highly civilized nations of the Earth.”
By this time the Hungarians were heaving like the sea. They had left their seats and were pressing towards the Emperor, silently, that they might not lose a word of his utterance; and it was evident that only etiquette restrained their emotions. Never before, not in modern times at least, had a monarch so flattered them. Not for centuries had they been saluted as a practically independent state, unhyphenated, for once permitted to stand alone under the crown of St. Stephen, the hated double-headed bird brushed lightly aside. The air seemed shaking with deep political import; more than one man was trembling violently within his barbaric splendors. The Emperor pulled himself up abruptly, and turned once more to his host, whose face, indignant and aghast, composed itself suddenly to courteous attention. William’s tones had been rich with sympathy for a race passionately admired. They now softened with filial affection. “But what has made the deepestimpression upon me, particularly during my reception in Budapest, is the enthusiastic devotion of Hungary to your Majesty. And not only here, but in all Europe, above all among my own people, does the same enthusiasm for your Majesty glow—an enthusiasm which I venture myself to cherish, in looking up, after the manner of a son, to your Majesty as my Fatherly Friend.
“Thanks to your Majesty’s wisdom, our union stands firm and unquenchable, a blessing to our people; for it has meant the peace of Europe for many years, and it will continue to do so for many more.
“Enthusiastic devotion to your Majesty—of this I am sure—dwells as firmly now in the hearts of the sons of Árpád as when they cried to your Majesty’s great ancestor, ‘Moriamur pro rege nostro!’”
He paused a moment before crying the hurrah for the King, which all present expected as a matter of course would be given in German. But William, under that apparently tactless exterior, capable of the profoundest diplomacy, had a still surer bolt in store. Raising his goblet on high, his eagle glance flashing from end to end of the pale company, his passionate tones thrilling the most antagonistic heart present, he cried:
“Giving expression now to these sentiments, we will put all we are capable of feeling, thinking, and praying for your Majesty into those words which every Hungarian utters with his latest breath—Élyen a Király!”
As the words rang out in the Magyar language, so jealously beloved and preserved, from the lips of a monarch whom duty had never commanded to cope with its difficulties, the tongue the King, his host, ignored, there was an instant of almost stupefied silence. Then some one gave anÉlyen!as wild and abrupt as a battle-cry, the spell broke, the hot blood of the Hungariansleaped to their heads, they forgot etiquette and crowded about the Emperor, shouting until the marble walls rumbled the echo. Their wild glances never wandered to the convulsed face of their King, nor from the triumphant eyes of the German. Several of the younger men and equally excited women stood upon chairs that they might see him better. Then for the first time in that old palace there rang out the word most hated in Hungary, “Élyen a császar! Élyen a császar!” (Hurrah for the Emperor!) Then again that most musical and thrilling of vocatives, “Élyen! Élyen! Élyen!”
Alexandra took her Count firmly by the arm and pushed him into a chair. “You don’t look very strong,” she said, “and you will faint if you are not careful.” Her own knees were trembling as she took the chair beside him, but she proceeded coolly, “What an infant you are to be taken in by the cleverest man in Europe—”
“He is the greatest man living,” stammered Zrinyi. “This is a great moment in the history of Hungary, mademoiselle. It should be painted and hung beside Munkacsy’sÁrpád, or theSally of Zrinyi from Szigetvár. He is the man for us!—the man for us!”
“I don’t doubt every mustache in Budapest will stand on end to-morrow. What a pity you have none.”
“Mademoiselle!” he cried, outraged at her flippancy; but she was moving away.
She had looked once at Ranata during William’s speech. The Archduchess, as the Hungarians pushed forward, had withdrawn from the Emperor’s side and stood leaning against the wall, her head bent, her arms rigid. Her face was expressionless, but, Alexandra commented, her hair had never looked so red.
William, as the King, experiencing satiety, led the way to the reception-rooms, turned his head rapidly in all directions, taking a final survey of the scene of his latesttriumph. His glance roved over faces angry, approving, terrified, adoring; encountered the amused stare of the American with haughty indifference, then rested suddenly on the face of his young hostess. The Archduchess had dropped her mask. Her head was thrust forward, deliberately waiting for the moment when William’s eyes must meet hers. When they did they lingered. The Hapsburg’s eyes blazed with a hatred so implacable, with a defiance so reckless and contemptuous, that the Almighty’s best-beloved experienced a shock. It seemed to him, for the first time in his triumphant career, that he heard the steel of another will clash menacingly with his own. Sustained in his dizziest flights by his honest belief in his earthly mission, insolently aware that he had the best brain in the royal hierarchy, the most splendid energy, a capacity for work never surpassed, he was fully convinced that he had but to develop his gifts, use all his vigilance and what patience he could find in him, to realize his vast ambitions. But for the moment, in the presence of another human will, and that the will of a woman, he experienced a chill rising of the imperial flesh. He forgot his majesty, flung his head high like an irritated stallion, glared back his defiance, and jerked his eyes away. In a moment he was reminded of his manners.
“Your arm, your Majesty,” said the cold voice of his hostess; and in silence, but with an impressive exhibition of royal self-control, they walked side by side through the first circle-room into the blue drawing-room. He was mightily uncomfortable, however, for in some subtle feminine way she made him feel as if she were towering above him by nearly a foot. It seemed to him that she grew an inch with every step, that her little crown of black pearls was rising higher and higher; and when he finally shot an apprehensive glance upward, almostlaughing aloud at his folly, he was relieved to find that her nose was still on a level with his brow. But she was making the most of her height, which, with the diadem on her lofty head and the immense train dragging behind her, would have made a man of her own inches look insignificant. It is doubtful if William ever breathed deeper relief than when, a few moments after arriving in the drawing-room, he was informed that the carriages were waiting to take himself and his suite to the train, and that he must make his adieux.
The guests had scattered through the long line of rooms. Many went out upon the balcony to watch the royal carriages and mounted escort cross the illuminated bridge, and the roar of cheering thousands seemed storming the hill. The royal party retired almost immediately, and Alexandra followed the Archduchess to the sitting-room of her private apartments. Ranata’s ladies had been dismissed, and she had closed the dressing-room door on her tire-women. She was standing alone at the window sobbing convulsively. The room was ringing withVivatsandÉlyens, for it was too hot to close the windows.
Alexandra pushed her into a chair, removed the pins and pearls from the heavy mane of hair, and sprayed her head and wrists with cologne. In a few moments the Archduchess had commanded her tears. She threw back her head and looked down upon shouting Pest with a sullen glare.
“What wouldn’t I have given to be able to wring his neck!” she said in a moment. “How dared he! At my father’s table! What insolent cruelty—he, who need fear no one living—to come here and fling his dynamite into the weak foundations of this poor old Empire! I wish to God I were on the thrones of Austria and Hungary. I’d pit myself against him without a qualm.It would be two of our ancestors over again and joy in the fight—I believe that in one of his exalted moments he enrolled Frederick the Great among his ancestors.”
“Well,” began Alexandra, but Ranata did not hear her. She had risen and was standing in the middle of the room, her long hair flaming about her. To the American girl, her quivering slender figure looked ready for a coat-of-mail, her head for the helmet. “I can’t help admiring the brute for flinging his designs in our faces,” she exclaimed furiously. “Did my father understand? The Hungarians?—The Emperor dies. Franz Ferdinand—Franz Ferdinand!—succeeds him. The Empire, bound together by rotten threads, begins its disintegration with my father’s corpse. Do you remember the rapacity of Europe, that greedy horde of vultures, after the death of Charles VI.?—Frederick’s swoop upon Silesia? William, ‘in the manner of a son,’ only awaits the death of his ‘Fatherly Friend’ to devour Austria to the gates of Vienna. And Hungary? Could you not see his bait? Hungary quiescent—Hungary once more an independent kingdom, or with himself as its nominal and indulgent ruler!—Oh, for another Pragmatic Sanction!”
“I have a plan—if you will sit down quietly for a few moments and listen to me. It is a practical plan, and I know it will appeal to you.”
The Archduchess resumed her seat. “Well? Tell it to me quickly. I am panting for a practical idea. But the blood is blazing in my head.”
“William has made a deep impression on the Hungarians, and no doubt they understood him plainly enough. But impressions can be counteracted. He leaves here to-night, and your father will be in no hurry to invite him again. Do you remain here this winter, instead of returning to Vienna with the Emperor—announce that you have found no city so fascinating, that youcannot tear yourself away; entertain constantly and brilliantly; let loose all your bottled personal charm—show them that you are the sister of Rudolf; be seen in public; make a royal pilgrimage through the villages. The Hungarians resent unceasingly that the Emperor spends but a few weeks of the year in Budapest—and they look upon Austria as a mere annex of the great kingdom of Hungary. They will be flattered—your slaves; with your personality, if you will come down off your high horse, they will end by adoring you—especially if you give them a royal good time. So much for the present. When the time comes! When the time comes! When the Empire shakes and William threatens, all you will have to do will be to have a King’s Mount ready, fasten the crown of St. Stephen securely on your head, ride up the mount, and wave your sword to the four corners of the earth. All Hungary would break into deficient Latin and shout, ‘Long live our Lady and King!’ The dust of Maria Theresia would quiver at that old war-cry—and she is no more forgotten here than in Austria. You will be a fool if you throw away the greatest opportunity ever offered to a woman cursed with royal blood.”
“It would almost be like meditating an act of usurpation,” muttered the Archduchess; but her head was thrust forward, her eyes were glittering. “But the alternative!—who knows? It might be for the best. It may be my destiny. These Hungarians! There are no people in the world so easy to arouse by appealing, not to their nerves and passions, but to their chivalry and highest ideals.” She stood up again in her excitement. “Do you remember when Maria Theresia, desperate and almost helpless, with Europe sucking at every vein of the Empire, the Austrian army an army of corpses—do you remember when she came here, young, beautiful,pregnant, eloquent, and appealed to Hungary to save her, how the magnates not only went off their heads and cried that they would die for her, but inspired more than their own retainers with their enthusiasm?—until from every mountain, from regions so remote that William had never heard of them, there poured down tribes so wild and terrible that Europe fled in dismay. If Austria exists to-day, she owes it to Hungary—and no Hapsburg since Maria Theresia has ever acknowledged the debt. And again—when Napoleon bribed and my great-grandfather appealed, how they spurned the one and poured out their blood for the other—who was neither picturesque nor grateful. Throughout their history the Hungarian character has been astonishingly consistent, their nationalism has been as unwavering, in spite of conquests and immigrations, as that of your own countrymen. They are as independent as republicans and as loyal as the British. But it makes them the easier for tact and diplomacy to manage. If I convinced them that I really loved them, that I was capable of the right sort of rule—oh, go now. I will think all night. Come down early, will you?”