Part 18 (1/2)
The Princess was the first to speak. ”Tell me, Your Excellency,” she said, ”do you admit my premises, now?”
”Are you, yourself, quite as sure of them, as you were?” he asked.
”Sure!-sure! I'm absolutely sure-I saw the truth in his eyes-didn't you, Armand?”
”No,” said the latter, ”I didn't-I never saw truth anywhere in Lotzen.”
”If he were innocent, why should he plead guilty?” she demanded.
”And if guilty, why should he admit it?” the Archduke asked.
”Because in this case the truth is more misleading than a lie-he had no notion we would believe him.”
”He is a very extraordinary man,” observed Courtney; ”his mental processes are beyond belief. Your question was the most amazing I ever heard, and should have been instantly decisive of his guilt or innocence; instead, it has only clouded the matter deeper for you and cleared it completely for him. Your cards are exposed-his are still stacked.”
”They are not stacked to me,” said Dehra; ”he is guilty.”
”Then, in that aspect, he has deliberately asked you what you're going to do about it.”
”I'm going to get the Book-for Adolph I don't care-I'm glad he killed the little beast.”
”And how,” said Armand, ”are we to get the Book? No ordinary means will suffice. Imprisonment would only make a martyr of him and strengthen him enormously with the n.o.bles and the people; and banishment is absurd; he may be the King.”
”If he has the Book, he would welcome banishment,” said Courtney; ”it would relieve him of your espionage. But, Your Highness, let me ask, why should he have it now? Armand admitted to the Council he is ineligible without King Frederick's decree, so why would Lotzen preserve that decree? The Book is not essential to his t.i.tle.”
The Princess shook her head incredulously. ”Ferdinand of Lotzen is a knave but I won't believe that of him.... A Dalberg destroy the Dalberg Laws! Inconceivable!-oh, inconceivable!”
”So, between the Crown of Valeria and the Book of Laws, you think he would chose the latter; and hand the Crown to Armand?”
”He would conceal the Laws-he wouldn't destroy them,” she insisted.
The Archduke reached over and took her hand.
”Little woman,” he said, ”your mistake is in rating Lotzen a Dalberg-he isn't; he's a vicious mongrel; if he had the Book, you can rest a.s.sured he destroyed it.”
But she shook her head.
”Your facts proved him innocent;” she smiled, ”and so they don't appeal to me to-day. I'm as sure he won't destroy the Laws as I am that he killed Adolph; what troubles me is how to recover them.”
”We have a year--”
”I don't intend to wait a year for your crowning, Sire,” she broke in.
”Nor half a year, either.”
He smiled indulgently, and pressing lightly the small fingers that still lay in his.
”The little Kingmaker,” he laughed.
”No, no!” she said, ”not I; Mr. Courtney is your Warwick and Valeria's benefactor-he saved us from Lotzen.”
”Then, your work is not finished, old man,” the Archduke remarked; ”there's a lot of saving to be done, I fear.”