Her Royal Highness: A Romance of the Chancelleries of Europe

For a second she remained motionless. Then she tried the safe door in order to reassure herself that it was securely locked, and turned to leave.

But as she did so a low cry escaped her hard, white lips.

She found herself face to face with Hubert Waldron.

Chapter Twenty Eight.

The Eyewitness

“Princess!”

“You!” she gasped, staring at him, her face white as death, and clutching at the back of a chair for support.

“Yes. I see now why you were so anxious that I should not remain in your company this evening,” he said in bitter reproach.

“Then —then you know!” she cried. “You —you saw me!”

“Yes. I have been watching you, and I can only say that I am surprised to find you tampering with His Excellency’s safe!” he said in a low, hard tone, while, as ill-luck would have it, old Ghelardi, in uniform, with a glittering star upon his coat, entered the room just at that moment and overheard part of the diplomat’s words.

“Ah!” said the crafty Chief of Secret Police, affecting not to have overheard anything. “Ah! these assignations – eh?”

She raised her hand towards him in a quick gesture, but from her glove, there fell the small key.

Ghelardi stooped and picked it up.

“Hallo!” he exclaimed, “what does this mean, Your Highness? A safe key!”

The unhappy girl, white as death, nodded in the affirmative.

The white-haired official stepped across, drew the brass cover aside from the keyhole, and tried the key. It yielded.

“And may I ask Your Royal Highness why I find you here, in His Excellency’s room, with a key to his private safe wherein, I believe, many secrets of our defences are kept?” he asked of her.

“I refuse to answer you, Signor Commendatore,” was her bold reply, as she drew herself up and faced him. “You have no right to question me. I shall answer only to His Majesty for what I have done.”

This bold declaration took Hubert aback.

“Very well,” replied the old man, pocketing the key and smiling that strange, cunning smile of his. “Your Highness shall be compelled to answer to him – and without very much delay.”

And he turned on his heel and without a word left the room.

“Ah! Mr Waldron,” she cried, wringing her hands, “what must you think of me? I know I have acted very foolishly – that I am mad – that I – ”

“Hush, Princess!” he said, his heart full of sympathy for her in her wild distress. “You have acted wrongly, it is true – very, very wrongly. Yet I am still your friend. I will see you safely out of this impasse – if you will only allow me. What is that document you have abstracted from the safe?”

She made no response, but placing her hand within her breast she very slowly drew it out and handed it to him.

Without opening the envelope he placed it in his pocket. Then taking her hand, he looked long and earnestly into her face and said:

“You had better return to the Palace at once, Lola. You are not well. Leave me to settle matters with Ghelardi.”

“But he will tell the King!” she gasped, wringing her hands in despair. “What can I say – how shall I explain?”

“Leave all to me,” he urged. “But before you go, tell me one thing. Why is Henri Pujalet in Rome?”

“No, no!” she shrieked, “do not mention his name. I – ah! no – do not torture me, I beg of you!” she went on wildly. “Hate me – denounce me as a spy, if you will – revile my memory if you wish – but do not taunt me with the name of that man.”

“I will see you to your carriage. Come,” he urged simply.

She struggled to calm herself, placing her gloved hand upon her beating heart, while the Englishman laid his hand tenderly upon her shoulder in deepest sympathy.

At first he had been horrified at discovering the bitter, amazing truth. But horror had now been succeeded by poignant regret and a determination to suppress, if possible, what must be, if divulged by Ghelardi, as no doubt it would – a most terrible national scandal.

While they were standing together, a Colonel of Artillery and two ladies entered, the former showing them the private cabinet of the head of the War Department. The women recognised the Princess by the decoration she wore at the edge of her bodice, and bowed low and awkwardly before her as she passed out, followed by Hubert.

With hurried steps he conducted her to the main entrance, and at once sent a servant for one of the royal automobiles, saying that Her Royal Highness was not well.

Together they waited in an ante-room almost without speaking. She seemed too nervous and overwrought.

“I trust you, Mr Waldron,” she said suddenly, looking up into his face. “Yet – ah! what can you think of me! How you must scorn and despise me! But – but I hope you will not misjudge me – that – you will make allowances for me – a girl – a very foolish girl?”

“Do not let us discuss that now,” he hastened to reply in a low, hard voice, for he never knew until that moment how mad was his affection for her.

And just then one of the royal flunkeys entered, bowing, to announce that the car was awaiting Her Royal Highness.

Their hands clasped in silence, and she walked out through a line of obsequious servants and down the flight of steps to the royal car.

As she went out a waiter stood behind the line of soldiers drawn up in the great vestibule, watching intently. Unobserved he had followed the pair when they had emerged from His Excellency’s private cabinet, and his shrewd eyes had noticed something amiss.

He was the same man who had passed Hubert earlier in the evening and whose face had so puzzled him.

The Englishman, after the royal car had driven away, turned and made his way back in search of Ghelardi.

The discovery held him utterly confounded. What secret was contained in that envelope she had stolen? Why had she a key to the Minister’s safe?

As he walked back, his mind tortured by a thousand strange thoughts and curious theories, the mysterious waiter followed him at a respectable distance, watching.

Hubert was wondering what had become of Pucci whom he ordered to be near him, and whom he had not seen the whole evening.

He gained the door of His Excellency’s room just as the Chief of Secret Police returned along the corridor.

“I have been endeavouring to discover His Excellency, but, unfortunately, I cannot find him anywhere,” the old man said. “We will open the safe and see what has been taken. It is utterly astounding to me that the Princess Luisa should be revealed as a spy.”

“I do not think we should condemn her yet,” urged Waldron. “There may be some explanation.”

“Explanation! What explanation can there be of a woman who takes advantage of a reception, when the sentries are relaxed, to creep up here, open the safe with a false key, and abstract documents.”

“I cannot see the motive,” declared Waldron.

“Ah! but I do. I and my agents have been watching for weeks,” he replied, and crossing to the safe he placed the key in the lock and again opened it.

Many formidable bundles of documents were disclosed, lying within, together with the thin envelope with which Lola had replaced the one she had taken.

Waldon took it up and turned it over with curiosity. Then, deliberately tearing it open, he pulled out its contents.

It was, he found to his dismay, only a blank piece of tracing paper!

“Ah! that is what she has placed here, after taking out a similar envelope, I suppose,” snapped the keen-eyed old man, grasping the situation in a moment. “I have suspected this all along – ever since those fortress plans so mysteriously disappeared. And now she has taken another document. I was foolish to allow her to leave with you.”

“The document – or whatever it is – is in my safe keeping.”

“You have it!” he cried quickly. “Please hand it to me.”

“I shall do no such thing, Commendatore,” was Hubert’s defiant reply.

“It is a secret of State, and you, as a foreigner, have no right to its possession!”

“It has been given to me for safety, and I shall hand it over to His Majesty, and to him alone.”

“Signor Waldron, I demand it,” the old man said angrily, raising his voice as he flung the safe door to with a clang and re-locked it. “I demand it – in the name of His Majesty!”

“And I refuse.”

“You defy me then?”

“Yes, I defy you, signore,” he replied firmly, his dark eyes fixed upon those of the crafty official.

“You are Her Highness’s lover. When the King is made aware of that fact he will show you little graciousness, I assure you,” said Ghelardi with a dry laugh.

“But you will remain silent upon that point, just as you will remain silent regarding what we have discovered to-night,” the Englishman said slowly. “No scandal must attach to the Princess’s name, remember.”

“Of course you wish to shield her – for your own ends. She is the spy for whom we have been searching all these weeks. It is she who placed in the hands of the our enemies the truth concerning the new fortifications along the northern frontier.”

“I refuse to discuss that point,” replied Hubert very coldly, but firmly. “One thing alone I demand of you, and that is silence – silence most absolute and profound.”

“It is my duty to inform the King of the whole circumstances.”

“True, it may be your duty, but it is one that you will not perform, Signor Ghelardi. Think of the terrible scandal throughout Europe if the Press got wind of it! And they must do – if you report officially, and it comes to the ears of His Excellency the Minister. The latter hates the Princess, because she accidentally snubbed the Countess Cioni at the ball at the Palazzo Ginori last week.”

“That is no affair of mine. Women’s jealousies do not concern me in the least. I am charged with the safety of the State against foreign espionage.”

“Well – in this case you’ve discovered the truth accidentally,” responded the diplomat, “and having done so, if you respect your Sovereign and his family, you will say nothing. Further, we may, if we remain silent, be able to obtain more information from Her Highness as to the identity of the person into whose hands the plans fell.”

“She abstracted them, without a doubt, for she had this duplicate key of the safe,” the old man declared.

“You will say nothing, I command you.”

“You! How can you impose silence upon me, pray?” he demanded fiercely. “You are a foreigner, and you are holding a State secret.”

“I shall hold it at present for safe keeping.”

“Then I shall go straight to the King and lay the whole matter before him.”

“You threatened to do a similar action before,” said the other very quietly. “I repeat my warning – that silence is best.”

“Then I tell you frankly that I refuse to heed your warning. It is my duty to my Sovereign to tell him the truth.”

“Very well – go to him and tell him – at your own peril.”

“Peril!” he echoed. “What peril?”

“The peril at which I have already hinted, Signor Ghelardi,” he answered in a low, hard voice. “Do you wish me to be more explicit? Well – there is in a village called Wroxham, in Norfolk, a mystery – the murder of a man named Arthur Benyon, a British naval officer – which has never yet been cleared up. One man can clear it up – an eyewitness who is, fortunately, still alive and who knows you. And if it is cleared up, then you, Luigi Ghelardi – who at the time occupied the office of Chief of the German Secret Service, and was directing the operation of the horde of spies who are still infesting East Anglia, will be confronted with certain very awkward questions.”

The old man’s face went livid. He started at Waldron’s words, and his bony fingers clenched themselves into the palms.

“Shall I say more?” asked the Englishman, after a brief pause, his eyes fixed upon the crafty chief of spies. “Shall I explain how Arthur Benyon, an agent of the British Intelligence Department, was attacked one summer night after sailing on the Norfolk Broads, being shot in cold blood, and his body flung into the river – how the revolver was thrown in after him, and how, half an hour later, a man, dusty and breathless, gained a car that had been waiting for him and drove through the night up to London. And the fugitive was yourself – Luigi Ghelardi!”

He paused.

“And shall I describe the hue and cry raised by the police: how at the inquest a man named James, employed on a wherry, made a queer statement that was not believed, and how you left London next day and returned to Germany? Shall I also describe to you what the eyewitness saw – and – ”

“No!” cried the man hoarsely. “Enough! enough!”

“Then give me that safe key and remain silent. If not, I shall also do my duty and explain to the King those circumstances to which I have just referred.”

Ghelardi reluctantly drew the key from his pocket, and having handed it to the Englishman, passed to the door in silence, staring in horror at the man who had so unexpectedly levelled such a terrible accusation against him.

He knew that Hubert Waldron held all the honours in that game. In his eyes showed a wild, murderous look.

Yes, he would treat the man before him as he had treated the Englishman, Benyon – seal his lips as he had sealed his own – if only he dared!

But Hubert Waldron, his hand upon the hilt of his uniform-sword, only bowed as the other slowly passed out. He knew now the reason why those two men, Merlo and Fiola, had been bribed to encompass his end.

Chapter Twenty Nine.

Reveals the Bondage

On his return home Hubert sat at his table, and very carefully broke open the stolen envelope.

To his surprise, he found that it merely contained several pieces of tracing linen upon which were many lines, angles, and numbers, all of which were quite unintelligible.

There were four small sheets, each about twelve inches square and as far as he could make out, they related to certain plans – or else they were plans in themselves. The scale seemed very small; therefore, after a long examination, he came to the conclusion that they must form the key to other plans, and had been reduced purposely, so that they could not be used without considerable preparation.

If they formed a key, this, no doubt, would be done in order that no improper use might be made of them.

The four pieces of tracing linen were practically covered with cabalistic signs and numbers, short lines, long lines, and all sorts of carefully ruled angles at various degrees. Yet there was nothing whatever upon them to show what they were.

There, during the night, beneath his shaded reading-lamp he strove to puzzle out their import.

Upon one he discovered that the various calculations appeared to be heights in metres and centimetres, and certainly in another were measurements concerning reinforced concrete.

Suddenly a startling thought flashed across his mind. The plans of the new fortresses on the Austrian frontier had been stolen, but as far as he could gather no use had been made of them. True, the army of Austria-Hungary had been mobilised and was held in secret, hourly ready for attack. Yet no formal representations had been made from the Vienna Foreign Office to Rome, and all inquiries had failed to establish that the reason of the secret mobilisation was actually due to the alleged act of war on the part of Italy.

Was it possible, therefore, that the plans stolen were worthless and conveyed nothing without that neatly executed key which lay spread on the blotting-pad before him? Would Her Highness, when she met him next day, reveal to him the truth?

For the present he had imposed silence upon his enemy, the crafty old Ghelardi. But how long would that last – how long before Italy, and indeed the whole of Europe, rang with the terrible scandal of a Royal House!

That night he locked away the envelope with its precious contents safely in his steel dispatch-box and still in his clothes, cast himself upon the bed to sleep. But it was already nearly five in the morning, and he failed even to close his eyes.

The discovery of Lola’s treachery had utterly bewildered and unnerved him. Surely she could not want money – and the temptation of money alone makes the traitor. He loved her still. Yes, after that first revulsion of feeling at the moment when he had caught her in the very act it had become more than ever impressed upon him that by her sweetness and beauty she held him in her toils – that he loved her with a mad, profound passion, a deep and tender love, such as he had never before experienced, not even in the case of that brilliant-eyed Andalusian who had been so near dragging him down to his ruin.

Ay, he loved her, even though the bitter truth how stood revealed in all its naked hideousness. Yet, alas! he could not tell her of his love. No. He dare not! Between them there existed a wide barrier of birth that was of necessity unsurmountable. She, a princess of the blood-royal, could never be permitted to marry a mere diplomat, any more than she could marry the man to whom she had given her heart, Henri Pujalet.

Thoughts of the latter brought reflections that he was in Rome. That fact was very curious, to say the least.

Had not the Frenchman urged him to keep his presence a secret from Lola? Why? He had, he said, arranged to meet her.

Feelings of the most intense jealousy and hatred arose within Hubert’s heart, for did he not remember that passionate love-scene he had witnessed beneath the palms in far-off Wady Haifa.

At nine o’clock the telephone bell rang, and he replied to it.

It was Renata, Lola’s maid, who explained that Her Highness would be unable to go out to Frascati, but would call upon him at noon – an appointment which he eagerly confirmed.

Just before eleven Waldron called upon General Cataldi and was shown at once into the Minister’s private room.

Without much preliminary he said in Italian:

“I am anxious to know whether another document of very great importance has disappeared from Your Excellency’s safe?”

The General looked at him keenly, in wonder at his meaning.

“I confess I scarcely follow you,” he replied.

“Well, I have suspicion that, during the reception last night another valuable confidential document was abstracted – an envelope containing several sheets of tracing linen.”

His Excellency, quickly taking the safe key attached to his watch-chain, rose eagerly and opened the big steel door.

“Yes,” he gasped, turning pale, “it’s gone! What do you know about it, signore?”

“No,” laughed the Englishman; “this is not quite so serious, for though it was actually stolen last night I already have it safe in my possession.”

“You!”

“Yes. I recovered it. But first please tell me to what the tracing refers.”

“Why, to the plans of our new fortresses along the Austrian frontier,” was his prompt reply. “I doubt if they would be understood without that key. Pironti declares they would be valueless.”

“Then the same person who stole the key would have stolen the original plans – eh?”

“Without a doubt. Who was the thief? You know, signore! I can tell it from your face.”

“True, I do know, but at present Your Excellency must excuse me if I remain silent. I hope in His Majesty’s interest – indeed in the interest of the Italian nation to be able to avoid a scandal.”

“But surely you can tell me in confidence. Signor Waldron,” the General protested. “The plans disappeared and I know from my own personal observations that His Majesty held me in suspicion, as responsible for their safe keeping.”

“No suspicion can further attach to you, General Cataldi,” the Englishman assured him, “nor to your secretary. But I have called to ascertain exactly the nature of the key plans.”

“I am much relieved if suspicion has been lifted from my shoulders, signore,” was the General’s reply. “I know that both you and our friend, the Commendatore Ghelardi suspected that someone in the Ministry had connived at this act of espionage.”

“The theft has been committed by a person outside the Ministry.”

“Who – do tell me who, signore,” he cried eagerly.

“Not at present. I can say nothing. I am only here to obtain further information, so that I may make a complete report to His Majesty and explain of what assistance Your Excellency has been to me.”

The General – the man who had accepted bribes from every quarter – hesitated for a few seconds. This man whom he had hitherto regarded as his enemy was, he thought, evidently his friend, after all!

“The tracings of the key were purposely upon a smaller scale, so that they would have to be enlarged by photography, or re-drawn, to be of any use,” he said. “Three days ago they were examined by the Committee of National Defence in view of the theft of the plans themselves; my secretary placed them in the safe prior to being returned to the Department of Fortifications.”

“Then I take it that the missing plans are quite useless to any outsider without the measurements and calculations upon the key?”

“That is so.”

“You have never stated this before,” remarked Waldron in surprise.

“No question has been put to me.”

“But the plans were stolen and the consequences extremely grave.”

“And Ghelardi has been in search of the thief. He is no friend of mine,” said the General with an expressive smile.

“Hence you have not mentioned the key – eh?” His Excellency smiled again in the affirmative. “Then, if the key is safe, the plans are, after all, useless?”

“Exactly, Signor Waldron. Indeed I question whether a foreign Power could make out what new construction were intended – and certainly they could not – without the tracings you refer to – discover the strength of the armaments of the forts.”

“Then that is all I require to know at present,” Hubert said, and a few moments later, as Pironti entered, he took his leave.

At noon he was standing in his room when the crooked-backed Peters ushered in Her Royal Highness. She was dressed smartly, but neatly, in deep black, with a large hat which suited her admirably, though her face was white as paper.

“I was unable to go out to Frascati,” she explained, as she put out her gloved hand to him. “So I thought it better to risk being seen and to call on you, Mr Waldron.”

The door was closed and they stood alone.

His eyes were fixed upon her, and for some seconds he did not reply.

“Lola,” he said at last, “I – I really hardly know what to say. The whole affair of last night is too terrible for words.”

“I know, Mr Waldron. Ah! I – I feel that I cannot face you, for what excuse can I make? I have no excuse – none whatever.”

“But why in Heaven’s name have you betrayed your country – why have you placed yourself so utterly and entirely in the hands of your enemies?” he cried in blank dismay.

“Because – ah! because I have been compelled.”

“Compelled to hand Italy’s secrets over to the hands of her enemies?” he asked in bitter reproach.

“Yes. But, at the time, I was in ignorance of what I was doing – of the fateful consequences – until, alas! too late.”

“And then?”

“Then, when I realised what! Had done – when I knew that I had made such a terrible mistake, and, further, that you were in search of the thief, I became horrified. Ah! you do not know what I have suffered – how horrible, how awful it has all been; in what constant dread I have lived all these long months, forced as I was to betray my country which I love.”

“Forced – what do you mean?” he asked with a very grave look.

“I was forced, because I was utterly helpless,” she gasped, her gloved hand upon the back of a chair to steady herself. “Last night I failed, because – because of you, Mr Waldron, and that failure means to me but one thing – death —death by my own hand!”

He stared at her, starting at her strange words. “Why, what do you mean, Lola?” he asked quickly. “Are you really in your right senses that you should say this?”

“I tell you quite openly and frankly, that I have come this morning to see you, because of my promise of last night – but it is to see you for the last time. Now, when I leave you I shall go back, and before to-day is out, I shall have bidden farewell to you – and to all!”

“No, no. You are not yourself to-day,” he said. “You – a Royal Princess – contemplating suicide! It’s absurd! Think of the terrible scandal – of your family, of the Royal House.”

“The scandal would be greater, if I dared to live and face exposure.”