Part 20 (1/2)
”No. No,” Hentzi cried nervously, ”that is suicide. We have been satisfied to take six hours.”
”With 'orses?” Alfred Anthony demanded, ”pretty good time with 'orses, but this is a Lion.”
Hentzi sat on the front seat during the long drive and pointed out the path. On the whole he was a good natured man but he did not permit the count's chauffeur to forget that he was talking to the count's secretary. Hentzi had formerly been a clerk in the estate office of the Temesvar family and had been promoted to his present position because he was faithful and a good linguist.
He was afraid of the count. Trent could detect a fear of him whenever the name was mentioned. When Hentzi warned the new chauffeur to be careful if his employer was in an angry mood the American demanded the reason.
”If I do my duty,” said the pseudo mechanic, ”he can't hurt me.”
”You talk as a child talks,” Hentzi laughed. ”He will do as he likes and as the devils that are in him at the moment. He fears neither G.o.d, man, nor devil. Pauline only may mock when he rages.”
”Who is Pauline?” Trent asked, ”the missus?”
”The Countess,” Hentzi said with dignity, ”is in perpetual retreat with the Ursuline sisters near Vienna.”
”Is Pauline the daughter?”
”His daughters are married.” Hentzi laughed, ”Castle Radna is not a place where it is wise to ask questions. You think because his excellency was cheerful when you last saw him he is like that always? I tell you if Pauline has been unkind he may visit it on you. I prefer that he does. I am tired of his humours and you are younger and stronger.”
”You don't mean he might hit me?” Trent cried.
Hentzi seemed to find Trent's anxious manner amusing.
”Most certainly he will,” the secretary a.s.sured him, ”but you need not be alarmed. He will fling you gold when his temper has spent itself.”
”I'm not going to let any man strike me,” Trent said doggedly. ”It would raise the devil in me and I might be sorry for it.”
”You would,” Hentzi said thinking that the chauffeur meant he might lose his job.
Anthony Trent, instead, was thinking that he might, in order to succeed in his venture, have to submit to indignities that would be torture to one of his temperament. It would not be wise to let the secretary know this so he turned the subject to the woman who dare laugh when the count was angry.
”Who is Pauline?” he asked.
”She was a skater from the Winter Palace in Berlin. She is beautiful or she would not be at Castle Radna; she is clever or she could not control Count Michael who has broken many women's hearts. She is bad or she would not have driven the countess from her home. For myself I hate her and the men and women with whom she fills the place.”
”So they keep a lot of company up there?”
”Company!” Hentzi replied, ”there is no such castle in Europe. I have seen life in Buda and Vienna but up there! You may be sure when the master drinks champagne the servants will drink _shlivovitza_. But do not think they are all Pauline's friends. No. No. The great of the world come there too and Pauline's friends are banished. You will drive great personages up from Fiume and you will not know who they are or what their errand.”
”Is the count a politician?”
Hentzi laughed with good natured contempt at such a nave query. Not to know Michael, Count Temesvar's reputation in the field of world politics was to admit ignorance of all the troubled currents which worried kings and presidents.
He was rudely brought back from his lofty att.i.tude by the sudden stopping of the car. He was almost thrown from his seat.
”Look!” Trent cried, pointing to a piece of close cropped turf, ”a golf green as I live.”
”What of it?” Hentzi snapped, ”what do you know of golf?”
”I used to be a caddie,” Trent lied glibly. ”Who plays there?”