The Peril and the Prince Read online

  Vida put her hand protectively over her breast.

  He looked at her for a long moment.

  Then he said,

  “You have certainly closed the Gates of Paradise – for tonight at any rate!”

  He walked across the room and, as he reached the shadows, he disappeared in the same strange way he had come, through the panelling in the wall.

  Vida gave a little sigh that should have been one of relief.

  At the same time she had the feeling that she had lost something very precious, something she might never find again.

  Chapter Four

  When the Prince had gone, Vida lay for some time just staring ahead of her and trying to think about what he had said to her and what she felt.

  But she found herself so bewildered by him that she was completely unable to decide what they should do.

  Then suddenly she knew that the best thing would be to talk to Margit and see if she had learnt anything.

  Moreover Margit, with her common sense and her down to earth attitude towards life, would perhaps take away the feeling of ecstasy that Vida had felt when the Prince had kissed her and she had touched the stars.

  She knew that Margit was in fact not far away and that by this time the Prince would have returned to his room.

  She had said yesterday after their arrival,

  “The housekeeper’s been very kind and because The Castle’s so big and we’re strangers to it, she’s put me on the same floor as you.”

  “That’s very convenient,” Vida had murmured.

  “I’m at the very end of this corridor,” Margit had said, “past His Highness’s suite in a room that faces into a courtyard and it’s ever so comfortable.”

  She spoke with a touch of pride that amused Vida. She knew that Margit always appreciated it when she was given privileges not accorded to other servants.

  “I shall know where to find you, if I want you,” Vida remarked.

  “I’ll be there when you wants me,” Margit said decisively.

  Vida felt that she must now talk to her at once and in Margit’s room. It would be easier there because, if people could eavesdrop in her own room, it was unlikely that the same applied to Margit’s.

  She put on a light robe over her nightgown and opened her door very quietly.

  She peeped out to find, as she expected, that the corridor was not in darkness, but there were fewer lights burning than when she had come up to bed.

  There was no sign of anybody about and she started to walk lightly along the thick carpet.

  It was quite a way and there were a number of rooms between hers and the Prince’s suite.

  She had almost reached the lofty painted doors that she had noticed in the daytime led into the Prince’s rooms, when just ahead of her she heard a sound.

  Instinctively, being afraid of being seen, she stopped and moved into the shadow of a doorway.

  As she did so, she saw a man appear from what she thought must be a secondary staircase that came out almost opposite the Prince’s door.

  The man was tall and seemed in the darkness somehow impressive.

  Then, without knocking, he opened what Vida guessed was the outer door to the Prince’s suite and the light inside fell on his face.

  As she watched him suddenly she was rigid, as if turned to stone, for the man who was just entering the Prince’s suite was Vladimir Demidovsky.

  For a second she thought that she must be dreaming.

  Then she knew that she had been saved from betraying her father and that in no circumstances must she trust the Prince.

  Vladimir Demidovsky disappeared, but there was a faint streak of light from the door he had left ajar.

  Knowing that this was her opportunity to reach Margit without being seen, Vida hurried forward, moving on tiptoe, ready to pass the door and carry on down the corridor.

  Then, as she reached it, she heard Vladimir Demidovsky’s voice speaking in Russian.

  “It was hard to make him talk, Your Highness.”

  “But you managed it?” the Prince asked!

  “I was somewhat rough with him.”

  “You mean you killed him?”

  There were no words of reply, but Vida was sure that Vladimir Demidovsky nodded his head.

  “He told you what you wanted to know?”

  The Prince’s question was sharp.

  “Yes, Your Highness. Sir Harvey is in the Monastery of St. Onutri at Lvov.”

  It was then, as Vida heard what was said, that she realised she was holding her breath.

  Moving with the swiftness of a frightened fawn she ran down the passage and entered Margit’s room.

  It was in darkness and she stood just inside the door which she closed quietly behind her and called, “Margit, Margit!” in a very low voice.

  “What is – it? What do you – want?” Margit asked in a sleepy tone.

  Then, as she knew the answer without Vida speaking, she sat up in bed and lit a candle.

  As she did so,Vida was beside her whispering,

  “Get up, Margit! We have to leave at once! I have discovered where Papa is and we must save him!”

  She had the terrified feeling that now that the Prince knew where her father was he would inform the Secret Police and it was only a question of time before, as she had felt since the beginning of the journey, her father was either put in prison or murdered.

  “Hurry, hurry!” she urged.

  “Now, listen, Miss Vida,” Margit said slowly. “We can’t leave before dawn, but I’ll tell Henri and he’ll have the carriage waitin’.”

  The calm way she spoke seemed to soothe away some of the terror that Vida was feeling.

  For a moment she was no longer the clever young woman confident of organising a secret attempt to save her father’s life as she had been when she left London.

  She was a child who wanted somebody to look after her and protect her.

  “Now, you go and get dressed, Miss Vida,” Margit said slowly as if she were thinking it out. “I’ll wake Henri. I know where he’s sleepin’. Then I’ll come and pack your trunk.”

  “Thank you, Margit.”

  Vida bent forward, kissed the maid on the cheek and said,

  “Nobody could be as wonderful as you in an emergency!”

  “Don’t talk when we are in your bedroom,” Margit said.

  “I know,” Vida answered, “the walls are hollow.”

  She did not add that there was a secret entrance, thinking if she did so that Margit might guess what had happened.

  Instead she peeped out into the corridor and saw with relief that the Prince’s door was closed and no longer was any light coming from it.

  That meant that either Vladimir Demidovsky had shut the door or else, having given the Prince the information he was waiting for, he had then left him.

  Vida ran back as swiftly as possible and moving like a ghost along the dimly lit corridor.

  As she reached her own bedroom, she was breathless. She stood for a moment with her back to the door, trying to quell the tumult within her breast.

  Then, as she realised that if nothing else she had found out where her father was, she sent out her thoughts towards him.

  She was trying to tell him that she was coming to him and if it was humanly possible she would find a way to rescue him.

  *

  Later, when they were driving away from The Castle, Vida could hardly believe that she had been so successful in escaping without any difficulty.

  She was already dressed when Margit came to her room and started to put her things in a large trunk, which fortunately was kept in an adjoining dressing room.

  Margit was wearing her black travelling clothes and looked so solid, unruffled and dependable that Vida was ashamed of her own feelings of panic.

  She did not speak and Margit merely took down her gowns from the wardrobe, folded them and put them into the trunk.

  Even as she closed the round-topped lid Henri came into the ro
om with a young footman.

  He was obviously a rather stupid boy and Vida was sure that Henri had chosen him because he asked no questions, but merely did as he was told.

  He and Henri carried her trunk along the corridor and avoiding the main staircase went down a secondary one, which led them to a door on the ground floor that opened into a courtyard at the back of The Castle.

  Dawn was just breaking but the first rays of the sun had not appeared over the horizon.

  Only the stars were fading a little in the sky and there was that hush over the world that is like a prelude to a play.

  The horses that were to draw the carriage were restless and Vida knew that they were fresh after their rest of the previous day.

  The coachman was on the box, Vida’s trunk was strapped on behind and then, as she and Margit stepped into the carriage, Henri climbed up beside the coachman and they were off.

  Only when she looked back and The Castle was no longer in sight did Vida feel a sense of elation, as if she had taken a high fence in a steeplechase and, although there were a great number of others ahead of her, her first effort had been faultless.

  She slipped her hand into Margit’s saying,

  “Thank you, Margit. Nobody but you could have helped me to get away so cleverly!”

  “Now, tell me exactly what you heard, Miss Vida.”

  Vida told her how she had seen Vladimir Demidovsky, who had approached her in Budapest and what she had overheard of his conversation with the Prince.

  “You suspected he was a Russian Agent,” Margit stated.

  “Yes, and we know now that the Prince is not to be trusted – and he too is against Papa.”

  There was a dull note in her voice, but Margit did not notice it.

  Vida was thinking that the wonder and ecstasy the Prince had aroused in her was false and only part of her imagination.

  How could she feel anything like that for a man who was prepared to murder her father as Vladimir Demidovsky had murdered a man?

  She was aware that the town of Lvov was a long way from The Castle, much farther than the distance they had travelled from Hungary.

  The road mercifully was level and in good repair and the horses were making excellent progress.

  By the time they reached the first inn on the road, they all, with the exception of Vida, were hungry for something to eat.

  She was so agitated that she felt that it would be impossible for her ever to eat again.

  The food was anyway unpalatable. At the same time the tea in its samovar was excellent and very reviving.

  She could understand how the Russians, whatever else they left behind, never went anywhere without their samovars.

  The horses were fed with the very best oats, which Henri had been shrewd enough to instruct the coachman to purloin from the Prince’s stable.

  As they set out again, Vida thought with joy that their pace was still good, but before long she realised that she was too optimistic.

  Later in the afternoon the road became much steeper with a broken surface strewn with rocks and thick with trees. And because of the danger of a broken axle, they were forced to go slowly.

  She almost cried with frustration, but there was nothing she could do about it.

  Instead, she could only pray fervently that in the Monastery her father was safe and that she would reach him before the Prince and his minions were able to do so.

  Then she told herself that, because His Highness was so clever at being an enigma to the British Government and perhaps even to people as astute as her father, he would not personally be involved in what happened next.

  He would probably relay the information to the Czar’s Secret Police and they would do the rest.

  She felt herself shudder as she remembered the terrible crimes they had committed and the horrors they had perpetrated in Russia since Alexander III came to the throne.

  His reign had opened with a persecution of the Jews that was unequalled in history.

  She remembered her father telling her that over two hundred and fifty thousand destitute Jews had been forced out of Russia into Western Europe.

  “Let them carry their poison where they will!” the Czar had said.

  There were a thousand other shameful actions that Vida could not bear to think about, but she could not suppress them and they kept recurring in her mind until she felt she would go mad.

  By the time they had passed through the mountainous region it was growing dark.

  There was therefore nothing they could do but spend the night in a village where the only accommodation for travellers was dirty and so inadequate that Vida felt that, after the comforts of The Castle, as if they had stepped down into a bog.

  She and Margit occupied a small bedroom together and, as they were quite certain that the beds were verminous, they slept in their clothes, lying on the rugs that Henri brought in from the carriage.

  Their supper consisted of a Russian soup that smelt unpleasant and tasted even worse and thick slices of black rye bread.

  There was, however, the inevitable but drinkable tea.

  It was difficult not to think of the delicious dishes she had been served with the previous evening and the caviar that had been available at any hour of the day.

  But hunger, sleeplessness and the smell of the unwashed rooms were unimportant beside the fact that she was much nearer to her father than she had been before.

  At least she knew where he was and that was all-important.

  Once again they set off at dawn and now the road was far better, although it was not possible to go as fast as Vida would have liked.

  They reached their destination after a long and tiring day, hungry and feeling indescribably dusty and dirty from the journey.

  The seventeenth century Monastery was just outside the town surrounded by a high wall, which Henri pointed out as they passed it.

  The bell tower of the Church rose above it and there was just enough light to see the heavily barred door that Vida guessed was the only entrance.

  She was already wondering despairingly how she could get in touch with her father, but it was too late that night to do anything but finding somewhere to rest.

  She had not only to think of herself but of Margit, who was looking very weary and, as she admitted, ‘feeling her age’.

  To their surprise there was a hotel, which, while certainly not luxurious, was clean and adequate.

  It had been built only in the last three years and was used, Vida learned, mainly by commercial travellers who went from City to City selling their wares.

  It was also a stopping place for those en route to the South.

  At any rate there it was and the food it offered was plain but nourishing, while the beds although hard were nothing like the verminous horrors they had endured the night before.

  “Now, go to bed, Miss Vida, and sleep!” Margit said firmly. “You’ll do no good worrying about the Master until it’s daylight. Then Henri can find out how we can contact him. Until then, remember – ‘a tired brain’s a useless one’.”

  Vida laughed as if she could not help it.

  “You are marvellous, Margit!” she exclaimed. “I cannot tell you what it means to me to have you with me!”

  “If I don’t get some sleep,” Margit retorted, “I tell you one thing, Miss Vida. I’ll leave my bones in Russia, which is a place I never could abide!”

  Vida laughed again.

  Then, as Margit left her, she climbed into bed.

  Once she had blown out the candles, she prayed first to her mother to help her and then she tried to send waves of thought to her father to let him know that she was near and had come to save him.

  *

  Vida must have fallen into an exhausted, dreamless sleep, for she awoke with a little start as the curtains were pulled back and she thought that Margit had come in to wake her.

  Then, as she opened her eyes, she realised that standing against the pale light from the window was not Margit, but a
man.

  She caught her breath and, as he turned round, she saw that it was the Prince!

  For a moment she was both speechless and motionless, just staring at him. She felt it could not be true that he was there, but if he was, then her journey was in vain and her father was doomed.

  He saw that she was awake and walked towards the bed to sit down on it, facing her.

  “You look very lovely in the morning,” he said in the same tone he might have used when they had been together at The Castle.

  “W-why – are you – here?”

  She knew the answer and yet she had to hear him say it.

  She felt that if he told her what he intended there would be nothing for her to do but die with her father.

  He looked for a long moment at the terror in her eyes and the way her lips trembled with fear before he asked,

  “Why did you not trust me?”

  “Trust – you?” Vida asked. “How – could I do that – when you – ”

  She paused, wondering how she could possibly put into words what she felt sure he was about to do.

  “If you had told me what you were thinking,” the Prince said, “you could have saved yourself a very uncomfortable journey and what I feel must have been an agony of apprehension.”

  “I-I don’t know – what you mean.”

  She was wondering if he had found out who she was, and if in fact, he now knew that she was her father’s daughter.

  He might be trying to trick her and she was therefore desperately afraid of saying the wrong thing.

  “Now that you are here,” the Prince said, “perhaps you will tell me how you intend to save your father.”

  “How did you – know that is – what I want to do?” she whispered.

  “When I learnt that you are Vida Anstruther,” the Prince said, “everything that had been puzzling me about you fell into place.”

  “H-how did you – find out?” Vida asked weakly.

  Before he could answer her she said,

  “Of course! It was – Vladimir Demidovsky who told you!”

  “Naturally!” the Prince agreed. “I presume that you must have seen him or become aware that he was in The Castle. He told me that he had spoken to you and, I thought, somewhat indiscreetly given you his name in Budapest.”