Weighed in the Balance

chapter 7
Monk set out on his journey northward with far more pleasure than the situation warranted. Evelyn was on the same train, and he looked forward to time in her company. She was delightful, elegant, always feminine. She carried her enjoyment of life and people in such a manner it spilled over onto all around her. Her humor was infectious, and he found himself laughing as well.

He left Venice with regret. Its beauty made it unlike any other city, and he would never again see light on rippling water without thinking of it. But there was also a sadness there. It was a city in decay, and occupied by a foreign army, a society looking to the past and disturbed and angry, fighting for the future. The people were divided among Venetians, who were crushed and resentful, awaiting the moment to strike back; Austrians, who knew they were away from home, in an old and lovely culture which did not want them; and expatriates, who belonged nowhere and lived on memories and dreams which even they no longer believed.

He had tried to express this to Evelyn when he met her briefly at the train station, but she was concerned about the comfort of travel arrangements and had no interest in such reflections. Klaus was gloomy, his huge figure looming in the background, shoulders a little hunched, mind preoccupied with what he would do when he reached Felzburg. He was impatient with railway officials, short-tempered with his own servants, and did not appear even to see Monk.

Evelyn rolled her eyes expressively and gave Monk a dazzling smile, as if the whole performance were somehow funny. Then she followed after her husband with an outward semblance of duty, but also a little swagger to her step, and a glance backward over her shapely shoulder at Monk before stepping up into her carriage.

They were several hours north, and Monk drifted off to sleep watching the countryside roll past. He woke with a jolt, both physical and of memory. For a moment he could not recall where he was traveling to. He had Liverpool in mind. He was going there to do with shipping. Huge Atlantic clippers filled his inner vision, a tangle of spars against a windy sky, the slap of water at the dockside, the gray stretch of the Mersey River. He could see the wooden sides of ships riding on the tide, towering above him. He could smell salt and tar and rope.

There was immense relief in him, as of rescue after terrible danger. It had been personal. Monk had been alone in it. Someone else had saved him, and at considerable risk, trusting him when he had not earned it, and it was this trust which had made the difference to him between survival and disaster.

He sat in the train with unfamiliar trees and hills rushing past the windows. The rattle and lurch were comforting. There was a rhythm to them which should have eased him.

But this did not look like any part of England he knew. It was not green enough, and it was too steep. He could not be going to Liverpool. His mind was blurred, as if sleep still clung to him. He owed an immense debt. But to whom?

The train had high divisions between each row of seats, giving a certain amount of privacy, but he could see that the man on the far side of the aisle was reading a newspaper. It was in Italian. Where would a man buy an Italian newspaper?

Monk glanced up at the luggage rack and saw his own cases. The label which was hanging down said "Felzburg."

Of course. Memory came back quite clearly now. He was trying to find evidence to clear Zorah Rostova of slander, which meant finding proof that Princess Gisela had killed Prince Friedrich. And that was impossible, because she had not only had no reason, she had also had no opportunity.

It was a fool's errand. But he had to do everything he could to help Rathbone, who had been uncharacteristically rash in taking the case in the first place. But it was too late to retreat now.

And Evelyn von Seidlitz was on the train. He smiled as he remembered that. With luck he would see her at dinner. That was bound to be a pleasure; it always was. And if they stopped somewhere agreeable, then the food might be good also. Although he was not looking forward to a night spent in a semireclining seat where it would be extremely difficult to do anything better than take short naps. He seemed to recall that somewhere in the world they had invented a proper sleeping car in the last four or five years. Perhaps it was America. Certainly it was not this train, even though he was traveling in the best accommodation there was.

It felt very natural. That was another discomfort to his mind. Once he had earned the kind of money which had made luxury an everyday thing. Why had he given it up to become a policeman?

This debt he owed was at the heart of it, but rack his mind as he might, it remained clouded. The emotion was sharp enough: obligation, a weight of fear lifted by someone else's loyalty when he had not yet earned it. But who? The mentor and friend he had remembered earlier with such growing clarity and grief? Had he ever repaid that debt, or was it still owing, and that was why it was so sharp now in his mind? Had he walked away from it, leaving it? He wanted to believe that was not possible. He may have been abrupt, at times unfair. He had certainly been overwhelmingly ambitious. But he had never been either a coward or a liar. Surely he had not been without a sense of honor?

How could he know? It was not merely a matter of going back, if that were possible, and paying now. And if it were his mentor, then it was too late. He was dead. That much had come back to him months before. It was necessary he should understand himself, to get rid of the pain of doubt, even if his fears about himself proved to be true. In a sense they were already true, unless he could prove them false. He could not leave this unresolved.

The train stopped regularly to take on coal and water, and for the needs of the passengers. Still, fifty years before, or less, he would have had to make this same journey by coach, and that would have been immeasurably slower and less comfortable.

As he had foreseen, dinner was taken at a hostelry along the way and was excellent. Klaus von Seidlitz had returned to the train a little earlier, in the company of two very solemn, militarily dressed men, so Monk spent a few minutes by the side of the track in the snatched company of Evelyn. He could see her face in the clear mountain starlight, in the sudden red flares of the sparks from the engine, and in the distant torches held by men as they labored to shovel coal and replenish the water for the night's journey northward across France.

He would like to have spoken to her for hours, asked her about herself, told her things he had seen and done which would bring the flash of interest to her face, intrigue her with the mystery and reality of his world. He would like to amuse her.

But Rathbone weighed heavily on his mind. Time was growing short, and he had nothing of worth to take back to the banister. Was he going to indulge himself, perhaps again, at someone else's expense? Was this the kind of man he was at heart?

He stared up at the sharp, glittering sky with its sweeping darkness, and at the pale clouds of steam wind-blown across the platform. The heavy noises of coal and steam seemed far away, and he was acutely conscious of Evelyn beside him.

"Has Zorah no friends, no family who could prevail on her to withdraw this insane charge?" he asked.

He heard Evelyn's sigh of impatience, and was furious with circumstances for offering him so much and at the same time preventing him from taking it. Damn Rathbone!

"I don't think she has any family," Evelyn replied sharply. "She always behaved as if she hadn't. I think she's half Russian."

"Do you like her? At least did you, until she did this?"

She moved a step closer to him. He could smell her hair and feel the warmth of her skin near his cheek.

"I don't care about her in the slightest," she replied softly. "I always thought she was a little mad. She fell in love with the most unsuitable people. One was a doctor, years older than herself and as ugly as an old boot. But she adored him, and when he died she behaved atrociously. She simply ignored everyone. Had him burned, of all things, and threw his ashes off the top of a mountain. It was all rather disgusting. Then she went off on a long trip somewhere ridiculous, up the Nile, or something like that. Stayed away for years. Some said she fell in love with an Egyptian and lived with him." Her voice was thick with disgust. "Didn't marry him, of course. I suppose you couldn't have a Christian marriage with an Egyptian anyway." She laughed abruptly.

Monk found all this peculiarly jarring. He remembered Zorah as he had seen her in London. She was an extraordinary woman, eccentric, passionate, but neither overtly cruel nor, as far as he could tell, dishonest. He had liked her. He saw no offense in falling in love out of your generation or with someone of another race. It might well be tragic, but it was not wrong.

Evelyn lifted her face to look at him. She was smiling again. The starlight on her skin was exquisite. Her wide eyes were all softness and laughter. He leaned forward and kissed her, and she melted into his arms.

The train arrived in Felzburg at noon. After several days' travel, Monk was tired and longed to stand in an unconfined space, to walk without turning after three paces, and to sleep stretched out in a proper bed.

But there was little time to be spent on such business. He had a letter of introduction from Stephan, whom he had left in Venice, and went immediately to present himself to Colonel Eugen.

"Ah, I was expecting you!" The man who received Monk was much older than he had imagined, in his middle fifties, a lean, gray-haired soldier who bore the marks of dueling on his cheeks and stood ramrod stiff to welcome his guest. "Stephan wrote to me that you might come. How may I be of help? My home is yours, as is my time and such skill as I possess."

"Thank you," Monk accepted with relief, although he was unsure even of what he was seeking, let alone how to find it. At least he was delighted to accept the hospitality. "That is most generous of you, Colonel Eugen."

"You will stay here? Good, good. You will eat? My man will take care of your luggage. The journey was good?" It was a rhetorical question. Monk had a powerful feeling that the Colonel was a man to whom any journey would be good if he reached his destination alive.

Monk agreed without additional comment and followed his host to where a good luncheon was set out on a dark wood table gleaming with embroidered linen and very heavy silver. A small fire burned halfheartedly in the grate. The paneled walls were hung with swords of varying weights from rapiers to sabers.

"What may I do to assist you?" Eugen asked when the soup had been served. "I am at your disposal."

"I need to learn the truth of the political situation," Monk replied candidly. "And as much of the past as I am able to."

"Do you consider it possible someone murdered Friedrich?" Eugen frowned.

"On the basis of the factual evidence, yes, it is possible," Monk replied. "Does it surprise you?"

He expected shock and anger. He saw neither in Eugen's response, only a philosophical sadness.

"I do not believe it could be Gisela Berentz, but I would not find it hard to believe that someone did it, for political reasons," he answered. "We are on the brink of great changes in all the German-speaking states. We survived the revolutions of '48." He dipped his spoon into his soup and drank without seeming to taste it. "The tide of nationalism is rising all over Europe, and most especially here. Sooner or later, I think we will be one nation. Sometimes principalities like ours survive independently. Some chance of history, or geography, makes them unique, and the large powers are content to let them be. Usually, they are swallowed up. Friedrich believed we could remain as we are. At least," he corrected, "that is what we thought. Count Lansdorff is a strong protagonist for that view, and, of course, so is the Queen. She has dedicated her life to serving the royal dynasty. No duty whatsoever has been too hard for her, no sacrifice too great."

"Except forgiving Gisela," Monk said, watching Eugen's face.

He saw no humor in it, no understanding of irony.

'To forgive Gisela would mean to allow her to return," Eugen answered, finishing his soup and breaking a little bread on his plate. "That is impossible! If you knew UMke, you would have understood that from the beginning."

A solitary manservant removed the soup plates and brought in roasted venison and boiled vegetables.

"Why are you prepared to help a foreigner inquire into what can only be a most distressing and unseemly affair?" Monk asked, accepting a generous serving.

Eugen did not hesitate. A shadow crossed his face, and his china-blue eyes flickered with what might have been amusement.

"A percipient question, sir. Because I can best serve my country and her interests if I know the truth."

Monk had a sudden chill rack him, as if the food he had swallowed had been iced. Eugen might just as well have added "That is not to say I will allow it to be repeated!" The meaning was there, for an instant, in his face.

"I see," Monk said slowly. "And what will serve your country? Accidental death? Assassination by a hired man, preferably unknown, or murder by his wife for her own personal motives?"

Eugen smiled coldly, but there was appreciation in his eyes.

"That is an opinion, sir, and mine you do not need to know, nor would it be in my interests that you should. Felzburg is dangerous at the moment. Feelings run very high. We stand at the crossroads of half a millennium of history, perhaps even at the end of it. Germany as a nation, rather than a language and a culture, may be at the beginning of hers."

Monk waited, not wishing to interrupt when he sensed Eugen had more to say. His host's eyes were bright, and there was an eagerness in him which he could not mask.

"Ever since the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire under Napoleon," Eugen went on, his food now forgotten, "we have been only scores of separate little entities, speaking the same tongue, having the same culture and hoping one day to bring to pass the same dreams, but each in its own way." He was staring at Monk intently. "Some are liberal, some chaotic, some dictatorial and repressive. Some long for freedom of the press, while both Austria and Prussia, the two greatest powers, believe censorship is as necessary to survival and defense as is an army."

Monk felt a faint stirring of memory. News of rebellions all over Europe one spring; men and women at the barricades, troops in the streets, proclamations, petitions, cavalry charging at civilians, shots into the crowd. For a brief spell there had been wild hope. Then despair had closed in as one by one the uprisings had been crushed and a subtler, deeper oppression had returned. But how long ago was it? Was that 1848?

He kept his eyes on Eugen's and listened.

"We had parliaments, briefly," Eugen went on. "Great nationalists arose with liberal ideas, freedom and equality for the vast mass of people. They too were crushed, or failed through their own ineptitude and inexperience."

"Here as well?" Monk asked. He loathed exposing his ignorance, but he had to know.

Eugen helped them both to an excellent Burgundy.

"Yes, but it was brief," he replied. "There was little violence. The king had already granted certain reforms and legislated far better conditions for workers and a measure of freedom for the press." A flicker of a smile crossed Eugen's lean face. It looked to Monk like admiration. "I think that was Ulrike's doing. Some people thought she was against it. She would have an absolute monarchy, if she could. She could rule like your Queen Elizabeth, give orders and chop the heads off those who defied her. But she is three hundred years too late for that, and she is far too clever a woman to overshoot the mark. Better to give them a little and remove the spur of rebellion. You cannot rule a people who hate you, except for a very short time. She has a long vision. She sees generations on the throne, stretching into the future."

"But there are no heirs," Monk pointed out.

"Which brings us to the crux of the matter," Eugen replied. "If Friedrich had returned without Gisela, if he had set her aside and married again, then there would have been." He leaned forward, his face fierce in its intensity. "No man of the Queen's party would ever have killed Friedrich. That is absolute! If he was murdered, then look for someone who is for unification, who does not mind being swallowed by Prussia, Hannover, Bavaria, or any of a score of others strong enough. Or one who had been promised office or possessions by any faction he believes can succeed. There was an attempt in '48 to make one of the Austrian archdukes king of all Germany. It failed, thank God. But that does not mean they could not try again."

Monk's head swam.

"The possibilities are endless."

"No - but they are large." Eugen began to eat hungrily, and Monk copied him. He was surprised how much he enjoyed the food.

"What about Prince Waldo?" Monk asked with his mouth full.

"I will take you to meet him," Eugen promised. "Tomorrow."

Eugen kept his word. His valet had pressed Monk's clothes. His evening suit hung in the wardrobe. His shirts were all laundered and gleaming white. His studs and cuff links were laid out on the tallboy, as were his brushes and toiletries. He spared a moment to be glad he had had the vanity and extravagance to purchase things of excellent quality at some time in that past he could not remember.

He had got as far as choosing cuff links, agate set in gold, when without warning he remembered vividly doing exactly the same, with these same links, before going to a dinner party in London. He had been accompanying the man who had taught him, sponsored him and sheltered him. He had had forbearance with Monk's ignorance and lack of polish, his impetuosity and occasional rudeness. With immeasurable patience, he had schooled him not only in the profession of investment banking, but in the arts of being a gentleman. He had taught him how to dress well without being ostentatious; how to tell a good cut, a good art; how to choose a pair of boots, a shirt; even how to treat one's tailor. He had taught him which knife and fork to use, how to hold them elegantly, which wine to select, when and how to speak and when to keep silent, when it was appropriate to laugh. Over a period of years he had made the provincial Northumbrian youth into a gentleman, sure of himself, with that unconscious air of confidence that marks the well-bred from the ordinary.

It was all there in his mind as his hand touched the small piece of jewelry. He was back in his mentor's house in London, twenty or more years before, about to go to dinner. The occasion was important. Something was going to happen, and he was afraid. He had enemies, and they were powerful. It was within their ability to destroy his career, even to have him arrested and imprisoned. He had been accused of something profoundly dishonorable. He was innocent, but he could not prove it... not to anyone. The fear gripped ice-cold inside him and there was no escape. It took all the strength he had to quell the panic which rose like a scream in his throat.

But it had not happened. At least he was almost sure of that. Why not? What had prevented it? Had he rescued himself? Or had someone else? And at what cost?

Monk had tried desperately to fight against injustice before, and lost. It had come to him before, a fragment at a time. He had remembered his mentor's wife, her face as she wept silently, the tears running down her cheeks in despair.

He would have given anything he possessed to be able to help. But he had nothing. No money, no influence, no ability that was a shred of use.

He did not know what had happened after that. All he could claw back from the darkness of amnesia was the sense of tragedy, rage and futility. He knew that was why he had given up banking and gone into the police: to fight against injustices like that, to find and punish the cheaters and destroyers, to prevent it happening again, and again, to other innocent men. He could learn the skills, and find the weapons, forge them if necessary.

But what was the debt he had recalled with such a stomach-freezing fear? It was specific, not a general gratitude for years of luridness, but for a particular gift Had he ever repaid that?

He had no idea ... no idea at all. There was simply a darkness and a weight in his mind - and a consuming need to know.

The reception was held in a huge hall brilliant with chandeliers hung from a carved and painted ceiling. There must have been a hundred people present, no more, but the enormous skirts of the women, gleaming pale in pastel and muted flower tones, seemed to fill the space. Black-suited men stood like bare trees among clouds of blossom. The light sparked prisms of fire off diamonds as heads and wrists moved. Now and again, above the chatter and occasional laughter, Monk heard the snap as some gentleman bowed and brought his heels together.

Most communications were naturally in German, but as Eugen introduced Monk, in deference to his unfamiliarity with that language, people changed to English.

They spoke of all sorts of trivialities: weather, theater, international news and gossip, the latest music or philosophical notions. No one mentioned the scandal about to break in London. No one even mentioned Friedrich's death. It had happened six months before and it might have been six years, or even the twelve since he had renounced his throne and his country and left forever. Perhaps in their minds he had died then. If they cared whether Gisela defended herself successfully or, indeed, if Zorah Rostova were ruined, they did not mention it.

Now and again conversation did become serious; then it was the aftermath of the conflicts of '48 that was spoken of, and the fiercer oppression which had followed, most especially in Prussia.

All the conversation was of politics, of unification or independence, of social or economic reforms, new freedoms and how they might be won, and above all, like a chill in the air, the possibility of war. Not once did Monk hear Gisela's name mentioned, and Friedrich's came up only in an aside - that he could no longer be a focus for the independence party, and speculating whether Rolf had the popular following to take his place. Zorah was mentioned, but as an eccentric, a patriot. If anyone commented on her accusation, Monk did not hear it.

Towards the end of the evening, Eugen found Monk again and presented him to Prince Waldo, the man who would inherit the crown by default. He saw a man of average height, rather stolid appearance, a face almost handsome but marred by a certain heaviness. His manner was careful. There was little humor about his mouth.

"How do you do, Mr. Monk," he said in excellent English.

"How do you do, sir," Monk answered respectfully, but meeting his eyes.

"Colonel Eugen tells me you have come from London," Waldo observed.

"Yes sir, but more immediately from Venice."

A spark of interest flared in Waldo's dark eyes. "Indeed. Is that coincidence, or are you pursuing some thread in our unfortunate affairs?"

Monk was startled. He had not expected such perception or directness. He decided candor was best. Remembering Rathbone, he had no time to lose.

"I am pursuing a thread, sir. There is a strong suggestion that your brother, Prince Friedrich, did not die solely as a result of his riding accident."

Waldo smiled. "Is that what is known as a British understatement?"

"Yes sir," Monk acknowledged.

"And your interest in it?"

"A legal one, to assist British justice to deal fairly..." Monk made a rapid calculation as to which answers would be likely to offend Waldo least. After all, Waldo had had a great deal to gain or lose by Friedrich's decision - not only his personal leadership of the country, but also his vision for the country's future. Friedrich had been for independence. Waldo apparently believed the best hope lay with unification. He could lose his own throne, but perhaps he was genuinely more concerned with the safety and prosperity of his people.

Monk stared at him and tried to make a judgment.

Waldo was waiting. Monk must answer quickly. The swirl of laughter and music continued around them, the hum of voices, the clink of glass. Light shattered into a thousand fragments from jewels.

If Waldo really believed the lives and the peace of his country lay in unification, then he had more reason than anyone to kill Friedrich.

"... with the issue of slander," Monk finished his sentence.

Waldo's eyes widened. It was not the answer he had expected.

"I see," he said slowly. "It is so serious a matter in England?"

"When it concerns the royal family of another country, yes sir, it is."

A strange flicker of emotion crossed Waldo's face. Monk could not read it. It might have been any of a dozen things. A few yards away, a soldier in resplendent uniform bowed to a lady in pink.

"My brother gave up his duties in his family over twelve years ago, and with it his privileges," Waldo said coolly. "He chose not to be one of us. Gisela Berentz never was."

Monk took a deep breath. He had little to lose.

"If he was murdered, sir, then the question arises as to who did such a thing. With the political situation as it is at present, speculation will touch many people, including those whose views were different from his."

"You mean me," Waldo replied unflinchingly, his brows raised a little.

Monk was startled. "More precisely, sir, someone who holds your views," he corrected hastily. "Not necessarily, of course, with your knowledge or upon your instructions. But it might be difficult to demonstrate that."

"Extremely," Waldo said, his eyes steady and hard, as if already he faced the charge and was steeling himself to it. "Even proof will convince only those who wish to be convinced. It will follow a long path before it reaches the ears of the common man."

Monk changed the subject. "Unfortunately, we cannot prevent the trial. We have tried. We have done everything in our power to persuade the Countess Rostova to withdraw her allegation and apologize, but so far we have failed." He did not know if that was true, but he assumed it would be. Rathbone must have at least that much sense - and desire for his own survival.

A flicker of humor crossed Waldo's face for the first time.

"I could have told you as much," he replied. "Zorah has never been known to back away from anything. Or, for that matter, to count the personal cost of it. Even her enemies have never called her a coward."

"Could she have killed him herself?" Monk asked impulsively.

Waldo did not hesitate an instant, nor did his expression change. "No. She is for independence. She believes we can survive alone, like Andorra or Liechtenstein." Again the shadow of humor crossed his face. "If it had been Gisela who was killed, I would have said certainly she could ..."

Monk was stunned. The words raced around his head. He tried to grasp their dozen possibilities. Was it conceivable that Zorah had meant to poison Gisela and, through some grotesque mischance, had killed Friedrich instead? This thought opened up vast possibilities. Could Rolf have done it, on his own or for his sister, the Queen? Then Friedrich would have had no impediment to returning to lead the independence party. Or could Brigitte have tried to kill Gisela so that Friedrich could return and she could marry him, to please the country and so she would one day be queen?

Or even Lord Wellborough? He could have been attempting to promote a war which could massively enrich him.

Monk muttered some reply, civil and meaningless, thanked Waldo for having received him, and backed away with his mind still in a tumult.

Monk woke in the night with a jolt, half sitting up in his bed as if someone had startled him. He strained his ears but could hear no sound in the darkness.

The same sense of fear was with him as the one he had felt while putting on his cuff links, an overwhelming isolation, except for one person ... one person who believed in his innocence and was prepared to risk his own safety in standing by him.

Was there anyone to stand by Gisela, or had she forfeited everything in marrying Friedrich? Was it really "all for love, and the world well lost"?

But it had been a different kind of love which had prompted Monk's one friend to fight for him at any cost, the loyalty that never breaks, the faith which is tested to the last. It had been his mentor who had jeopardized his own reputation on Monk's innocence. He knew that now. He could remember it. He had been accused of embezzlement. His mentor had staked his own name and fortune that Monk was not guilty.

And that had been enough to make them search further, to carry him until the truth was found.

And sitting up in bed with the sweat clammy on his body in the cold night air, he also knew that he had never repaid that debt. When the tide had been reversed, he had not had the ability, or the power. All he possessed was not enough. The man he had most admired had lost everything: home, honor, even, in the end, his life.

And Monk had never been able to repay. It was too late.

He lay back with a feeling of emptiness and a strange alone-ness of the irretrievable. Whatever was given, it would have to be to someone else. It could never be the same.

The following afternoon he was presented at court. He needed to know whether it could be that Gisela herself was the intended victim, and he dreaded telling Rathbone.

And yet perhaps of all the possible answers, the one he had thought the worst of all, that Zorah killed him herself, was, in fact, the least appalling. What if it were Prince Waldo, to prevent Friedrich from corning home and plunging the country into war? Or Rolf, on the Queen's behalf, meaning to kill Gisela and thus free Friedrich to return, and he had tragically killed the wrong person?

What would the British legal system, and British society, make of that? How would the Foreign Office and its diplomats at Whitehall extricate themselves from that morass with honor - and European peace?

How much of all of this did Zorah Rostova know or understand?

Queen Ulrike was a magnificent woman. Even after what he had heard of her iron resolve, Monk was unprepared for the force of her presence. At a distance, as he entered the room, he thought she was very tall. Her hair was glittering white, and she wore it swept up high on her head, braided in a natural coronet inside a blazing tiara. Her features were straight and strong, her brows very level. She wore shades of ivory and oyster satins with so slight a hoop that her skirts seemed to fall almost naturally. She stood with her shoulders squared and her gaze straight ahead.

When it was his turn to be introduced, and he walked forward, he saw that she was actually of no more than average height, and closer to, it was her eyes which startled and froze. They were clear aquamarine, neither green nor blue.

His name was announced.

"Your Majesty." He bowed.

"Count Lansdorff tells me you are a friend of Stephan von Emden, Mr. Monk," she said, surveying him with chilly courtesy.

"Yes, ma'am."

"He met you at the home of Lord Wellborough, where my unfortunate son met his death," she continued with no discernible emotion in her voice.

"I stayed there a few days," he agreed, wondering what Rolf had told her and why she had chosen to raise the subject.

"If you are a friend of Baron von Emden's, then possibly you are also acquainted with the Countess Rostova?"

His instinct was to deny it for serf-protection. Then he looked at her cool, clear eyes and was startled, even chilled, by the intelligence in them, and by a glimpse of something which might have been emotion, or simply force of will.

"I know her, ma'am, but not well." To such a woman the truth was the only safety. Perhaps she knew it already.

"A woman of dubious tastes but unquestionable patriotism," she said with a ghost of a smile. "I hope she will survive this present storm."

Monk gasped.

"Are you enjoying Felzburg, Mr. Monk?" she continued as if they had been discussing something of equal unimportance. "It is a most agreeable time of year for concerts and theater. I hope you will have the opportunity during your stay here to visit the opera."

It was an indication that the interview was at an end.

"Thank you, ma'am, I am sure I shall find it excellent." He bowed again and withdrew, his head swimming.

He should have looked forward to the evening immensely. It was a ball to which Eugen had seen he was invited and where he knew Evelyn would also be present. All too soon he would have to return to London and to the reality of his life as it was. Whatever it had been before he had left it to go into the police force, that luxury, that easy acceptance of pleasure, was part of a past he could never relive in memory, much less return to. At least for the time left to him, he would, by act of will, forget the past and the future. The present was everything. He would enjoy it to the fullest, drink the cup of it to the last drop.

He dressed with care, but also with a sense of satisfaction, almost delight. He surveyed himself in the glass and smiled at his reflection. It was elegant and at ease in its beautiful clothes. The face that looked back at him had no diffidence, no anxiety. It was smooth, slightly amused, very sure of itself.

He knew Evelyn found him exciting. He had told her just enough to intrigue her. He was different from any other man she knew, and because she could not understand him, or guess what was really behind the little she could see, he was dangerous.

He knew it as clearly as if she had said it to him in words. It was a game, a delicately played and delicious game, the more to be savored because the stakes were real: not love, nothing so painful or so demanding of the self, but emotion for all that, and one that would not be easily forgotten when he had to leave. Perhaps from now on something of it would be echoed in every woman who woke a hunger and a delight in him.

He arrived at the magnificent home of the host for the ball and strode up the steps. Only a sense of dignity stopped him from racing up two at a time. He felt light-footed, full of energy. There were shimmering lights everywhere: torches in wrought iron holders outside, chandeliers inside blazing through the open doors and beyond the tall windows. He could hear the hum of conversation almost as if the music were already playing.

He handed in his invitation and hurried across the hallway and up the stairs to the reception room. His eyes swept over the crowded heads to find the thick, dark hair of Klaus von Seid-litz. It took him a moment or two. Then someone turned, taller than the others, and he saw Klaus's face with its broken nose and heavy features. He was talking to a group of soldiers in bright uniform, recounting some tale which amused him. He laughed, and for a few moments he was a different man from the brooding, almost sullen person Monk had seen in England. In repose his face had seemed cruel; now it was genial, and merely crooked.

Monk searched for Evelyn and could not see her.

Rolf was standing not more than a dozen yards from him. He looked polite and bored. Monk guessed he was there from duty rather than pleasure, perhaps courting a political interest. Now that Friedrich was dead, where did the independence party pin its hopes? Rolf had the intelligence to lead it. Perhaps he would have been the person behind the throne if a plan to reinstate Friedrich had succeeded. Maybe he had always intended to rule.

Who would be the rallying point now, the person with the popularity, the image people would follow, would sacrifice their money, their houses, even their lives for? That kind of loyalty attaches only to someone with either a royal birthright or a character of extraordinary valor and passion - or to someone who can be seen as a symbol of what the people most desire. It does not matter whether that loyalty is born of truth or fiction, but it must ignite a belief in victory that overrides the defeats and the disappointments, the weariness and the loss.

Rolf had not that magic. Standing on the last step and looking across the heads of the guests at his strong, careful face, Monk knew it, and he imagined Rolf did too.

How deep did Rolfs plans run? Staring at his steady, fixed gaze, his square shoulders and ramrod back, Monk could believe they might well be deep enough to have murdered Gisela and created out of Friedrich the hero he needed - the rightful heir, bereaved, repentant, returned to lead his people in their hour of greatest peril.

Only the plans had gone disastrously wrong; it was not Gisela who had died, but Friedrich himself.

"Mr. Monk?"

It was a woman's voice, soft and low, very pleasing.

He turned around slowly to see Brigitte smiling at him with interest.

"Good evening, Baroness von Arlsbach," he said a little more stiffly than he had intended. He remembered feeling sorry for her at Wellborough Hall. She had been very publicly rejected by Friedrich. Hundreds of people must have known how deeply the royal family had wanted him to marry her, and that she had been willing, even if only as a matter of duty. But he had steadfastly refused, and then had been prepared to sacrifice everything for love of Gisela.

And Brigitte was still unmarried, a most unusual circumstance for women of her age and station. He looked at her now, standing a few feet away from him. She was not beautiful, but there was a serenity in her which had a loveliness that was perhaps more lasting than regularity of feature or delicacy of coloring. Her eyes were steady and straight but had none of the ice of Ulrike's.

"I did not know you were in Felzburg," she continued. "Have you friends here?"

"Only new friends," he replied. "But I am finding the city most exhilarating." It was true, even if it was due to Evelyn's presence in it rather than any qualities of the city itself. The industrial cities of northern England would have been exhilarating for him had Evelyn been there.

"That is the first time I have heard it described so," she said with amusement. She was a big woman with broad shoulders, but utterly feminine. He noticed how flawless her skin was, and how smooth her neck. She was wearing a king's ransom in jewels, an unusual necklace of cabochon star rubies and pearls. She must hate Gisela, not only for the personal humiliation but also for what she had taken from the country in luring away Friedrich, who would fight for independence, and leaving Waldo, who seemed genuinely to believe in unification. And she had been at Wellborough Hall.

The thought was repellent, but it could not be swept away, no matter how hard it was to believe, standing there on the steps overlooking the ballroom and seeing the peace in her face.

"You don't find it so?' he asked. He thought of sounding surprised, then changed his mind. She would think it affected, perhaps even sarcastic. She was as aware as he, perhaps more so, that it was a very small city compared with the great capitals of Europe, and almost provincial in nature.

As if reading his thoughts, she answered. "It has character and individuality." Her smile widened. "It has a vigor of life. But it is also old-fashioned, a little resentful of sophisticated people from our larger neighbors, and too often suspicious because we dread being overshadowed. Like most other places, we have too many officials, and they all seem to be related to one another. Gossip is rampant, as it is in all small cities. But on the other hand, we are hospitable and generous, and we do not have armed soldiers in the streets." She had not said she loved it, but it was there far more eloquently in her eyes and her voice. If he had been uncertain of her loyalty to independence before, he was not now.

Suddenly exhilarating seemed a false word to have used. He had been thinking of Evelyn, not the city, and it was patronizing to speak falsely of thousands of people's lives and homes.

She was looking at him curiously. Perhaps she saw something of his thoughts reflected in his face.

"I wish I could stay longer," he said, and this time he was sincere.

"Must you leave?"

"Yes. Unfortunately, I have business in London which will not wait." That was truer than she could know. "Perhaps you will do me the honor of allowing me to accompany you in?"

"Thank you." She took his proffered arm and began down the steps. He was about to tell the footman who he was when the man bowed deferentially to Brigitte and took Monk's card.

"The Baroness von Arisbach ... and Mr. William Monk," he announced.

Immediately there was a hush as heads turned, not to Monk, but to Brigitte. There was a murmur of respect. A way parted for them to enter the crowd. No one pushed forward or resumed their previous conversation until the couple had passed.

Monk realized with a rush of heat to his face how presumptuous he had been. Brigitte had very possibly not aspired to be queen, as apparently Gisela had, but her people had wished it. She was revered next only to Ulrike, and perhaps better loved.

His earlier pity for her faded To be one man's passionate love was perhaps a quirk of nature no one could create or foresee. To be loved by a country was a mark of worth. No one who held it should be thought of slightly.

The music was beginning in the room beyond. Should he invite her to dance? Would it be insulting now if he did not, or would it be a further presumption if he did? He was not used to indecision. He could not remember ever having felt so gauche before.

She turned to face him, holding out her other hand. It was gracefully done, an unspoken acceptance before he had time to make either mistake.

He found himself smiling with relief, and led her onto the floor.

It was another half hour before he was able to find Evelyn. She was as light in his arms as a drift of silk, her eyes full of laughter. They danced as if there were no one else in the huge room. She flirted outrageously, and he reveled in it. The night would be far too short.

He saw Klaus looking melancholy and rather bad tempered, and all he could feel was a vague distaste. How could such a miserable man expect to hold a creature like Evelyn, who was all wit and happiness?

An hour later, dancing with her again, he saw Klaus talking earnestly with an elderly man Evelyn told him was a Prussian aristocrat.

"He looks like a soldier," Monk agreed.

"He is," she replied, shrugging her lovely shoulders. "Almost all Prussian aristocrats are. For them it is practically the same thing. I dislike them. They are terribly stiff and formal, and have not an atom of humor between them."

"Do you know many of them?"

"Far too many!" She made a gesture of disgust. "Klaus often has them in the house, even to stay with us in our lodge in the mountains."

"And you don't care for them?"

"I can't bear them. But Klaus believes we will ally with Prussia one day quite soon, and it is the best thing to make them your friends now, before everyone else does and you have lost your advantage."

It was a peculiarly cynical remark, and for a moment the laughter faded a little, the lights seemed sharper, glittering with a harder edge, the noise around him shriller.

Then he looked at her face, and the laughter in it, and the moment passed.

But he did not forget her story of Klaus's deliberate courting of the Prussians. Klaus was for unification, perhaps not for his country's sake but for his own. Did he hope to emerge from such forced union with greater power than he now held? Friedrich's return would have compromised that. Had he feared it, and killed Friedrich to prevent it? It was not impossible.

The more Monk considered the idea, the more feasible did it seem.

But it hardly helped Rathbone. Then again, nothing that seemed even possible, let alone likely, would help Rathbone. The only person who seemed to care about Zorah was Ulrike. That curious remark of hers came back to his mind.

At midnight he was drinking champagne. The music was lilting again, strictly rhythmic, almost willing him to dance. Until he could find Evelyn, he asked the nearest woman to him, and drifted out onto the floor, swirled and lost in the pleasure of it.

It was nearly one when he saw Evelyn and contrived to end the dance close enough to her, and she had equally contrived to be away from Klaus and had laughingly passed by her previous partner before he could invite her again.

They came together moving to the music as if it were an element of nature and they simply were carried upon it, as foam upon a current of the sea. He could smell the perfume of her hair, feel the warmth of her skin, and as they spun and parted and came together again, see the glow in her cheeks and the laughter in her eyes.

When at last they stopped for breath, he lost count of how many dances later, it was at the edge of a group of others, some fresh from the floor, some sipping champagne, light winking in the glasses, flashing fire on diamonds in hair and on ears and throats.

Monk felt a sudden surge of affection for this tiny, independent state with its individual ways, its quaint capital, and its fierce desire to remain as it was. Maybe the only common sense, the only provident way forward, was to unite with all the other states into one giant nation. But if they did so then something irreparable would be lost, and he mourned its passing. How much more must these for whom it was their heritage and their home mourn?

"You must hate the thought of Prussia marching in here and taking over," he said impulsively to Evelyn. "Felzburg will be simply a provincial city, like any other, ruled from Berlin, or Munich, or some other state capital. I can understand why you want to fight, even if it doesn't seem to make sense."

"I can't!" she replied with a flicker of irritation. "It's a lot of effort and sacrifice for nothing. We can always go to Berlin. It will be just as good there... maybe better."

A footman passed by with a tray of champagne, and she took a glass and put it to her lips.

Monk was stunned. He looked beyond Evelyn to Brigitte, who was smiling with her mouth, but her eyes were aching with sadness, and even as Monk watched she blinked and he saw her breast rise as she breathed in deeply, and the moment after turned to the woman next to her and spoke.

Surely Evelyn must see that. She could not be as shallow as she had sounded.

"When are you going back to London?" Evelyn asked, her head a little on one side.

"I think tomorrow, perhaps the next day," Monk answered with regret.

Evelyn looked at him, her brown eyes wide. "I suppose you have to go?"

"Yes," he replied. "I have a moral obligation to a friend. He is in considerable difficulty. I must be there when his time of crisis comes."

"Can you help him?" It was almost a challenge in her voice.

Beyond her a woman laughed, and a man proposed a toast to something or other.

"I doubt it, but I can try," Monk replied. "At the very least I can be beside him."

"What purpose is there, if you can't help?" Evelyn was looking very directly at him, and there was an edge of ridicule in her voice.

He was puzzled. It seemed a pointless question. It was simply a matter of loyalty. One did not leave people to suffer alone.

"What sort of trouble is he in?" she pressed.

"He made a misjudgment," he replied. "It seems as if it will cost him very dearly."

She shrugged. "Then it is his own fault. Why should you suffer for it?"

"Because he is my friend." The answer was too simple to need elaboration.

"That's ridiculous!" She was half amused, half angry. "Wouldn't you rather be here with us - with me? At the weekend we go to our lodge in the forest. You could come. Klaus will be busy with his Prussians most of the time, but you shall find plenty to do. We ride in the forest, have picnics and wonderful nights by the fire. It is marvelously beautiful. You can forget the rest of the world."

He was tempted. He could be with Evelyn, laugh, hold her in his arms, watch her beauty, feel her warmth. Or he could return to London and tell Rathbone that if Friedrich had been the intended victim, then Gisela could not have killed him, but Klaus could have. However, it was far more likely that actually it was Gisela who was meant to be the one who died, and it was only mischance that it had been Friedrich, which doubly proved her innocence. Lord Wellborough could have been guilty, or someone acting for Brigitte or, far worse, for the Queen. Or Zorah could have done it herself.

He could attend the trial and watch Rathbone struggle and lose, watch helplessly as the lawyer damaged his reputation and lost all he had so carefully built in his professional life.

Of course, Hester would be there. She would be trying every last instant there was, racking her brain for anything to do to help, lying awake at night, worrying and hurting for him.

And when it was all over, even if he was criticized, ridiculed and disgraced for his foolishness, his alliance against the establishment, she would be there to stand beside him. She would help to defend him to others, even if in private she castigated him with her tongue. She would urge him to get up and fight again, face the world regardless of its anger or contempt. The greater his need, the more certainly would she be there.

He recalled with a surge of warmth how she had knelt in front of him in his own worst hour, when he was terrified and appalled, how she had pleaded with him, and browbeaten him into the courage to keep on struggling. Even at the very darkest moment, when she must have faced the possibility of his guilt, it had never entered her mind to abandon him. Her loyalty went beyond trust in innocence or in victory, it was the willingness to be there in defeat, even in one which was deserved.

She had none of Evelyn's magic, her beauty or glorious charm. But there was something about her clean courage and her undeviating honor which now seemed infinitely desirable - like ice-cold pure water when one is cloyed with sugar and parched with thirst.

"Thank you," he said stiffly. "I am sure it is delightful, but I have a duty in London... and friends... for whom I care." He bowed with almost Germanic formality, touching his heels. "Your company has been utterly delightful, Baroness, but it is time I returned to reality. Good night... and good-bye."

Her face dropped slack with amusement, then tightened into a blazing, incredulous rage.

Monk walked back towards the staircase and the way out.