Chapter I: Two Years Afterwards

"Here's to the Princess of Czernova!" cried Noel Trevisa,--a dark-eyed, handsome young fellow,--raising his glass as he spoke. "Have you seen her yet, Paul?"

Captain Cressingham, or to use the new name assumed by him on the death of a relative, Captain Woodville, smiled at the enthusiasm with which his friend proposed the toast.

"I entered Slavowitz only last evening," he replied, "and have already been asked that question six times. It seems to be the first one put to a visitor."

"And when you have seen her you will cease to wonder at the pride of the Czernovese in their princess. Natalie Lilieska is more than beautiful,--she is Beauty's self."

This interchange took place on an elevated balcony of the Hôtel de Varsovie, the principal establishment of its kind in Slavowitz, the picturesque capital of the old Polish principality of Czernova.

Between Paul and his companion stood a marble-topped table decorated with a bottle of Chartreuse and a box of cigars, and in the quiet enjoyment of these luxuries the two Englishmen yielded themselves to lazy abandon in the soft sunshine of a spring morning, watching the gay current of Czernovese life as it flowed along the boulevard beneath their feet.

Two years had elapsed since the night when Barbara had been carried off to perish, as Paul believed, in the engulfing of Castel Nuovo.

A fishing-barque passing by next morning had taken Paul from the island; its arrival was timely, for the vessel had scarcely gone half-a-mile when the sea became violently agitated, and Isola Sacra itself disappeared beneath the waves. The frightened fishermen, perceiving that the force of the earthquake was not yet spent, refused to put in on the Dalmatian coast, believing it to be safer on water than on land. For four-and-twenty hours they kept out on the deep, disembarking only when they deemed the peril past.

The moment Paul touched land he made his way to the vicinity of Castel Nuovo, and found its site covered by the sea. Must he believe that the last resting-place of Barbara was fathoms deep below these waves? He rowed to and fro over the spot, peering through the singularly transparent water, and sometimes fancying that he could discern the ghostly outline of towers and battlements.

Had Barbara really been lodged at Castel Nuovo during the night of the earthquake, or at some other place?

Inquiries carried on by him within a wide area around Castel Nuovo yielded no tidings as to the missing maiden. Barbara, Jacintha, Lambro, were like the shadows of a past dream.

Blank despair settled upon Paul. Life seemed scarcely worth living.

Then came news that the British troops stationed at Corfu had been ordered to India to suppress a rising among the hill-tribes of the frontier.

Paul, whose first impulse had been to resign his commission, now decided to accompany his regiment lest his retirement on the eve of war should be attributed to a spirit of cowardice. The fierce thrill of fighting might help to drown the memory of Barbara--for a time. And since life without her was hard to bear, he cherished the hope that an Afghan spear might give him the death he desired.

On his arrival at Corfu, Paul learned that, owing to the death of a wealthy aunt, he was now master of considerable landed property in Kent, subject to the condition that he should assume his relative's name of Woodville. Paul mechanically acquiesced, and was henceforth gazetted as "Captain Woodville."

"Cressingham or Woodville, what matters?" he said. "Soon to be a little dust, I hope."

This legal formality over, he hurried off to India.

In the campaign that followed he did not die; on the contrary, he lived to gain a brilliant reputation,--a reputation destined, though he foresaw it not, to stand him in good stead during a political crisis of the future.

In a small border-fortress he found himself one of a garrison of four hundred men besieged by an Afghan force twenty times its own number.

It was winter, and the mountain-passes were filled with snow.

Weeks must elapse ere relief could come. Scantily provided with artillery, their provisions running out, sleepless from incessant attacks, the heroic little band kept grimly to the work.

Early in the siege the major in command, with two or three officers, yielding to a spirit of fear strange in English soldiers, proposed in council an unconditional surrender.

"We were sent here," said Paul, darkly and haughtily, "to hold the fortress, not to cede it. If you do not know your duty, Major, there are those who will teach it you. I will shoot the first man that talks again of surrender, be he commandant or be he private."

And without delay Paul took strong measures. He put his own superior, together with the recreant officers, under arrest, and he himself took the command. Upon this there arose from the garrison, when informed of what had taken place, a ringing British cheer that startled the enemy in their distant entrenchments.

Paul henceforth was the soul of the fight,--at the head of every sortie, charging the enemy regardless of their number. The garrison attributed his conduct to sheer devilry; it was, in truth, the despairing mood of a man bent on finding death.

Ever amid the clash of arms he seemed to see before him the beautiful face of her whom he had lost, and scarcely conscious of the fact, he would cry "Barbara! Barbara!" to the bewilderment of his men. The wild Afghans shrank back in dismay whenever the "Feringhee devil" turned his dripping sabre in their direction, deeming the "bar-bar-a" uttered by him to be a magic spell capable of dealing death around.

When at last the long-desired relief came, and the story of the heroic defence of Tajapore became known to the world, Paul found that he had unintentionally become a famous person.

At the end of his second year in India Paul made a remarkable discovery.

Up till that time he had entertained the belief that Cardinal Ravenna had perished in the Dalmatian earthquake, though strange as it may appear, he had not thought of putting his opinion to the proof by ascertaining whether the Sacred College had actually lost a member in the year '45. However, being in the club-room at Poonah one day, he happened to be glancing over a continental newspaper, when his eye was caught by the following paragraph,--

"The Pope has been pleased to appoint Cardinal Ravenna to the archiepiscopal see of Slavowitz."

Paul laid down the paper trembling with new hope. If the cardinal had survived the earthquake, why should not Barbara likewise? Could it be that she was really alive?

Till that moment Paul had been ignorant of the name of Slavowitz, but a reference to a dictionary of geography informed him that it was the capital of Czernova, the latter being a small independent state on the borders of Austria and Russia.

He resolved to set off immediately for this principality, for the purpose of interviewing the dark-dealing cardinal in whose breast was contained the secret of Barbara's history.

Two years' assiduous attention to duty easily earned for Paul a long furlough. He quitted India, arrived at Alexandria, and took ship for Constantinople; thence travelling post-haste day and night he threaded the passes of the Balkans, crossed the Danube, traversed the forests of the Carpathians, and finally arrived at Slavowitz late at night, where he was much disappointed to learn that the new archbishop was absent from his see, having gone on a journey to Rome, his return, however, being daily expected.

Paul determined to await his coming.

On this, his first morning at Slavowitz, while gazing from the balcony of his hotel, he caught sight of an old college chum in the person of Noel Trevisa.

Paul immediately cried to him by name, and in a moment more the two friends were sitting together renewing old memories; and great were Trevisa's surprise and admiration on learning that the Captain Woodville whose name had become familiar to all Europe, was the same as his old friend, Paul Cressingham.

"And what has brought you to this city?" inquired Paul, when the other had drunk his toast to the fair ruler of Czernova.

"This city is my adopted home. Formerly professor of English at the university of Slavowitz, I am now private secretary to the loveliest princess in Europe, and occupy a suite of apartments in the palace."

"Accept my congratulations. How did you, a foreigner here, obtain the post?"

"Thaddeus the Good--"

"Who is he?"

"Was, my dear fellow--'was' is the word, inasmuch as he is no more--the late Prince of Czernova, her Highness's father. He died six months ago."

"I understand. Proceed."

"Prince Thaddeus, about two years ago, offered me the post of tutor to his daughter Natalie. I was to instruct her in English Literature and English Constitutional History. Naturally I did not refuse so charming a student. When a few months later her secretary resigned through ill-health, the princess installed me in his place, where I am proud to be. I wish I could persuade you too, Paul, to take service under her Highness."

"What! Accept command in a toy army destined never to smell powder! All thanks to you, Noel, but I prefer to remain with the old Twenty-fourth."

"That's a pity, for the princess is very desirous of officering her army with men experienced in warfare. And of all nationalities she seems to prefer the English. On her return from Dalmatia--"

"From where?" interrupted Paul, sharply.

"From Dalmatia. Why shouldn't she go there?" retorted Trevisa, aggressively.

"Why not, indeed? And how long is it since she returned from Dalmatia?"

"About two years."

"Ha! proceed."

Paul's strange manner led Trevisa to wonder whether his head had not become affected by his two years' residence in the tropics.

"Well, as I was about to say, after her return from Dalmatia, one of the first acts of the princess was to appoint a new uniform for her body-guard. Accordingly sketches of the various costumes worn in the different European armies were laid before her. You, my dear Paul, ought to feel honored by her selection."

"Why so?"

"Because the uniform she chose is one so like your own that for my part I fail to detect the difference. As you walk through the streets of Slavowitz you will certainly be taken for one of her _corps du garde_, known as the Blue Legion."

A strange suspicion entered Paul's mind.

"How old is the Princess Natalie?"

"She celebrated her nineteenth birthday last week."

"Barbara, if she were living, would be twenty-one by this time," murmured Paul to himself; and then aloud he added: "And you say that the princess is very beautiful?"

"Be thyself the judge," smiled Trevisa. "Within a quarter of an hour from now she will pass along this boulevard on her way to the Mazeppa Gardens. From the balcony here you will have a good view of her."

"Haven't you her portrait upon you?"

"At present I have with me no other likeness than this."

And here Trevisa drew forth a gold-piece, bright as if fresh from the mint.

"The new coinage, issued this week. Reverse--the double-headed eagle, the ancient arms of Poland. Obverse--the profile of the princess with the legend '_Natalia, Princeps Czern. Amat. Patr._' 'Natalie, Princess of Czernova, Lover of her Country.' Did the goddess Athene carry a more dainty head than this?"

Paul took the coin, glanced at the obverse, and then sat in a state wavering between belief and unbelief.

Was this golden disc really stamped with the head of Barbara? So it seemed to Paul. At any rate, if her profile had been engraved on metal with due regard to fidelity, it would have differed little or nothing from that on the coin.

Then a new idea seized him, and one more consonant with probability. Was this the profile of the maiden whose portrait he had seen in the cardinal's secret study at Castel Nuovo--the maiden with the laughing eyes, the sceptre and the diadem?

"A graceful head, a very graceful head," he remarked, returning the coin. "I should like to hear more of the fair lady."

"As many questions as you please."

"First, where did the Princess Natalie pass her childhood and youth?"

"Here in the city of Slavowitz and its vicinity. Of course she has had her travels like the rest of us, and has visited different European countries, but, speaking generally, she was reared and educated in the Vistula Palace, whose towers you can see rising behind yon cathedral spire."

Clearly not Barbara, for Barbara had spent her earlier years at Warsaw, her later in the Illyrian Convent of the Holy Sacrament.

"And what of her visit to Dalmatia?"

"That was undertaken two and a half years ago; at that time she was in a delicate state of health, and the physicians recommended a tour around the Adriatic. She travelled incognito with a slender suite under the care of Cardinal Ravenna."

"Who took her, among other places," thought Paul, "to Castel Nuovo, as is proved by the fragment of lace in the secret corridor."

"This tour was productive of singular results," continued Trevisa, musingly.

"In what way?"

"Well, it was to have lasted three months, but it was extended to six; and when the princess returned she was an altered being; I do not mean in appearance, I refer to her character."

Light began to dawn upon Paul. The Princess Natalie had not returned to Czernova; instead there had come her living image--Barbara!

"What remarkable development had the princess's character undergone?"

"Beforetime she was a gay and vivacious maiden. She returned grave and sedate. This change was attributed to the earthquake."

"The earthquake?"

"Yes. Don't you remember the great upheaval on the Dalmatian littoral two years ago?"

"Ah! I remember something of the sort, now I come to think of it."

"Well, the terrible scenes witnessed by Princess Natalie, together with her own nearness to death, seem to have sobered her from girlhood into womanhood. From that time she began to take a keen interest in state affairs, which she had previously regarded as boredom."

"Barbara was keenly interested in politics," thought Paul.

"Beforetime her predilections, if she had any, were in favor of Russia. She returned divested of her Muscovite sympathies."

"Barbara was decidedly an anti-Muscovite," thought Paul.

"But the greatest change--"

"Yes, the greatest change--?" repeated Paul, observing that the other had stopped short in his utterance with the air of one about to be betrayed into an imprudent statement.

As Trevisa did not reply, Paul drew a bow at a venture.

"The princess was reared in the Greek faith, I am given to understand? Humph! what was Prince Thaddeus thinking of when he placed his daughter under the tutelage of Cardinal Ravenna? One can guess the result. The princess went away a Greek, and came back a Catholic. Is it not so?"

"Hush!" muttered Trevisa, glancing around in some trepidation. "Yes, that is so. You have hit on a state secret, communicated only to her cabinet, and to me--her secretary. But, Paul, breathe not a word of this to any one, for the knowledge of it would shake her throne, and--"

He paused. There was a sudden commotion in the street below. Pedestrians had stopped in their walk, and were crowding to the edge of the pavement with their faces all set in one direction, whence came the distant sound of cheering and of clapping hands. The applause rolled in _crescendo_ along the boulevards, advancing nearer each moment to the two friends.

"Here comes the princess!" cried Trevisa, springing to his feet. Paul felt his heart beating as it had never beat before when he turned his eyes towards the approaching cavalcade.

First came a detachment of Polish uhlans, their burnished lances glittering in the morning sunshine, and the points decorated with black pennons that fluttered in the breeze.

The handsome regimentals of this _corps du garde_, the Blue Legion, promptly drew from Paul the remark,--

"Why, their uniform is the same as the Twenty-fourth Kentish!"

"A remark previously made by me," observed Trevisa, drily. "You are singularly forgetful, Paul."

On came the lancers at a swinging trot, followed by an open landau containing the princess.

A moment more and this carriage was abreast of the hotel, and as if fortune were favoring Paul, the vehicle was brought to a sudden stand-still opposite the balcony on which he stood.

The equipage was a dainty one, lined with pale blue silk, the arms of Poland gleaming in gold from the polished sable panel. The fine black horses, with coats like shining satin, were decked in silver harness.

But Paul saw nothing of this equipage; his eyes were set upon its occupant.

There, seated in graceful state, with silken sunshade poised above her head, and responsive to the plaudits of the people by sweet smiles and a courteous bending of her head, was--the youthful and beautiful Barbara!

The supreme joy of realizing that she was actually living so affected Paul that for a moment the whole street--Barbara, soldiers, people, buildings--became a confused swimming vision. A sound like the murmur of many waters filled his ears.

With difficulty he controlled his first impulse to descend the hotel steps, crying "Barbara! Barbara!" It set his teeth on edge afterwards when he recalled how near he had come to making a fool of himself. No, his first interview with her must not take place in the open street before a wondering, gaping throng.

Fearing lest she should glance upwards and recognize him, Paul drew aside behind a screen of aloes that decorated the balcony, and continued to watch.

Yes, it was truly Barbara. The convent-fugitive who had strolled with him through the pine-woods of Dalmatia, the Polish maiden whom he had held in his arms had become a real princess with a court, ministers, and an army at her command. The wonderment of it all! And though she had spent nearly a third of her life in a convent, yet there she sat with the air of one born in the purple. It was amazing, nay, charming, to mark the dignity and the ease with which she carried herself in her new state.

The landau of the princess had been stopped before the Hôtel de Varsovie in order to enable her to address two pedestrians, who, judging from the respect paid to them by the crowd, were persons of distinction in the little world of Czernova.

The first was an elderly, silver-haired man of fine presence, and distinguished by a stately, old-fashioned courtesy.

"Count Radzivil," replied Trevisa, in answer to Paul's question. "The prime minister of Czernova, brother of the celebrated Michael, who commanded the Polish insurgents of '30."

As the premier was old enough to be Barbara's grandfather, Paul could afford to view him with composure; but the case was very different with the other individual.

He was a man of lofty stature, and of broad, massive build, with a dark, handsome face set off with black eyes and a black beard. The sunbeams toyed with the silver eagle upon his helmet. His splendid uniform glittered with gold lace, stars, and orders. He carried himself erect, his left hand resting upon the hilt of his sabre; and it was clear that both in his own opinion, and also in the opinion of the crowd, he was a very grand personage indeed.

"Who's His Serene Tallness?"

"John the Strong, Duke of Bora, commander of the Czernovese army, a member of the cabinet, and the heir-apparent to the crown. He is first cousin to the princess, and likewise a near kinsman of the Czar."

Envy and misgiving stole over Paul as he contrasted his own inferior rank with that of the imperially-connected Bora. Barbara was bending forward in her carriage, laughing pleasantly, and apparently holding an animated conversation with the duke. One might almost have thought that she was exerting all her arts to please him.

Paul surveyed him more attentively, and quickly gauged his character,--an individual naturally sullen, of a somewhat slow intellect, yet not without ambition; a man upon whom the graces and restraints of polite life lay but lightly; a little provocation, and the savage would soon be in evidence. What could Barbara find in this man to interest her?

"Bora seems on excellent terms with the princess," said Paul.

"Naturally, seeing that he is to marry her."

"What?"

Paul's intonation was so sharp that Trevisa turned to survey him.

"Why, Paul, how white you're grown!"

"Merely a pang from an old wound. But your princess; she can't entertain any real love for _that_ fellow."

"Love was never fashionable at courts," smiled Trevisa. His words jarred upon Paul. If Barbara had become such that she could marry without any love on her side, then her nature must have sadly changed from what it was in the old sweet days at Castel Nuovo.

"It is a _mariage de convenance_," continued Trevisa, "tending to secure her position on the throne, and--but see, she is about to set off again."

The princess, having finished her conversation, drew off her right glove and extended her fair jewelled hand to the duke with a smile and graciousness of manner that roused all the jealousy in Paul's nature.

"She has forgotten me," he murmured bitterly. "Well, of course, she thinks me dead; but even if she knew otherwise, it is not likely that she will pay much regard to me now. And yet what were her words to me on the day that we were parted? 'If I were an empress, Paul, I would be your wife.' Humph! we shall see."

Bora raised the delicate hand to his lips amid the applause of the crowd, who seemed to regard the incident as a very pretty tableau.

Count Radzivil lifted his hat with courtly grace, and the next moment the landau was gliding smoothly along the Boulevard de Cracovie, followed by a detachment of cavalry similar in equipments to that which had preceded it.

Paul was left a victim to perplexing thoughts.

What had become of the real Princess Natalie, and why had Barbara assumed the name, title, and sceptre of the daughter of Thaddeus, personating the character with such art and tact as apparently to defy detection, since Trevisa, though long resident in Czernova, had no suspicion of the substitution that had taken place?

Had Barbara a just title to the throne? Recalling her air as she sat in the landau, Paul felt that he could not associate the appropriation of another's heritage with that winsome and dignified presence. No, difficult though it was to explain her conduct, he would believe anything rather than that she was a conscious and willing usurper.