The Rider Read online

  “I wonder,” mused Hemmington Main, “if your gift of prophesy will prove as painfully inspired in my case as it has in yours.”

  M. Kargovitch laughed. “I have it in my power, my friend, to save us both,” he said; “but at a cost against which the lives of two men are as nothing, for should I speak now it would throw Margoth and Karlova into bloody war. Alexis of Margoth could scarce overlook the double affront and injury which I have put upon his daughter; and could he, the people of Margoth could not. They worship her, nor, since I have seen her, do I wonder.

  “If, through the American minister, you can obtain a sufficient stay the truth must eventually come out, and with the truth known you will be freed from the accusation of having attempted the life of Prince Boris of Karlova.”

  “If the truth is bound to be known,” suggested Main, “why the devil don’t you divulge it now and save your own life?”

  M. Kargovitch shrugged. “There are several things worse than death, at least to a man in my position. One of them is ridicule. I have made a fool of myself; and I should be laughed at-deservedly. I could not endure it. There is another reason. Within the past two days I have been a party to a hideous hoax, the entire brunt of which fell upon a defenseless girl. I would almost as lief die as look her in the face again, for, inexplicable irony of fate, I have found that I love her.”

  Hemmington Main, his head tilted to one side, looked quizzically through narrowed lids at his fellow prisoner.

  “I can’t fathom you, Kargovitch,” he said. “You are cerlainly the most remarkable brigand the world has ever produced.”

  “Yes,” replied Kargovitch, “I am a remarkable brigand. As a matter of fact, Main, I rather suspect that the Lord never intended me for a brigand at all.”

  In a little back room in the attic of Peter’s Inn a man tossed feverishly upon a pile of grimy quilts and blankets. Above him bent a bewhiskered little man whom two others in the room addressed as “Doctor.”

  “He will live,” announced the man of medicine, “if he has proper nursing.”

  “Bakla will look after him well,” said Peter. “Eh, Bakla?”

  “Yes,” replied the girl, “I will take care of him.”

  Peter and the doctor left the room, stumping down the rickety ladder which led to the floor below, and the girl took her place upon an upturned keg near the sick man’s head, that she might change the cold cloths upon his burning forehead.

  An hour passed. The man’s mutterings and tossing ceased. He opened his eyes in which now’ shown the light of rationality.

  “Bakla,” he exclaimed. “What has happened? What am I doing here?” And then, before she could reply: “Ah, yes; I remember. The American. He shot me. Have you heard anything? Have the papers come yet from Sovgrad? I should like to hear what they have to say, and also what Prince Boris says. I should like to learn how he has explained the thing. I am glad, Bakla, that I am a brigand and not a prince. Go down and fetch the papers, Bakla, will you?”

  The girl renewed the cloth upon The Rider’s head and descended the ladder to the second floor from which she ran down to the bar room. The Sovgrad papers, still unopened, lay upon a table near the door. She gathered them all up and returned to her patient. They laughed together over the guarded announcement of the reported assassination of the crown prince, and of the strange disappearance of his body. Then Bakla read of the capture of The Rider by the soldiers of Margoth and the probable fate which awaited him in Demin.

  The Rider whistled and looked solemn. “That will never do,” he said, ‘he is a real man, even if he is a prince-far too good a man to make the acquaintance of a rope’s end.”

  “You think they would hang him?” almost screamed Bakla.

  “They might,” replied The Rider. “They would not believe him should he say he was Prince Boris of Karlova-no, they would only laugh at him, for did they not see me in Demia only yesterday and vouched for as the crown prince of Karlova?”

  “But his friends-they know the truth?” persisted Bakia.

  “I wonder if they do,” mused The Rider. “The whole thing has been so terribly tangled and confused that it is possible they might really believe that it is the true Rider who lies in prison at Demia, and that Prince Boris, who was to have met me at his hunting lodge today, arrived there ahead of time and was actually the man who was shot by the American. They would be none too loath to have me out of the way, for if their connection with this affair becomes known they will probably suffer degradation and imprisonment Oh, the devil take that American! He has put me in a fix which won’t let me do a thing.”

  Bakla sat in silence for a long while. Her eyes were very wide, and fear-filled. Presently The Rider slept. His regular breathing denoted the deep and healing slumber which is Nature’s greatest remedy. The girl rose and tiptoed to the head of the ladder. Quietly she descended. Tillie was busy with the house work on the second floor.

  “Listen for The Rider,” said Bakia to her. “If he calls, go to him I am going to Sovgrad. I will be back as quickly as possible.”

  Tillie would have interposed objections but the girl was gone before she could frame or voice them. A few minutes later, astride a tall, lanky roan who knew the highways of the border better by night than by day, she was riding at a rapid gallop toward Sovgrad.

  In time to the drumming hoof beats of the great horse Bakla droned, over and over: “They’re goin’ to hang Dimmie! They’re goin’ to hang Dimmie! They’re goin’ to hang Dimmie!” and the horror in her eyes increased to the inborne suggestion of the hideous thought.

  Prince Boris of Karlova spent a long and weary day in the prison at Demia. Early in the afternoon an officer had come and taken the American away without explanation. Boris wondered if they were going to shoot him, too, or if he had been extradited to Karlova, which was the more probable.

  As a matter of fact Hemrnington Main had been conducted to the palace, led to the second floor, and ushered, without a word of explanation, into the presence of three women. Two he recognized at once -Mrs. Bass and Gwendolyn, and a moment later he was presented to the third, and found himself bowing very low over the hand of Princess Mary of Margoth.

  “It was the suggestion you wrote across Her Highness’s picture this morning which resulted in our being freed in less than half an hour,” explained Gwendolyn Bass; “But for the longest time nothing could be done for you. His majesty could not be prevailed upon to release you, even though we all offered to vouch for your presence when ever you were wanted. He was awfully nice and kind about it all, but you see you are a very important prisoner, and he could take no chance of offending Karlova by seeming to look lightly upon your offense.”

  “Well, how did you accomplish it then?” asked Main. “I don’t seem to be very rigidly imprisoned now.

  “We don’t know what happened to change my father’s mind,” said the princess. “All we know is that a few minutes since M. Klein came to announce that you were to be liberated, and I asked that you be brought directly here.”

  “Well,” said Hemmiugton Main, “it beats me. I wish some good angel might intercede for my fellow prisoner. He seems an awfully good sort-not at all the kind one would take for a brigand, and he’s so brave in the face of the fact that he is to die at dawn.”

  “Die at dawn?” cried Princess Mary of Margoth. “Die at dawn? what do you mean?”

  “I heard them read his sentence just a short time before I was liberated-he is to be shot in the morning, poor fellow. And do you know,” continued the American, “there’s a mighty pathetic side to it. It seems that he has it within his power to save himself; but pride and honor are keeping his lips sealed. There’s something about a girl he has fallen in love with-I couldn’t make out just what it was all about-but he’s offended her in some way and would rather die than let her know the truth. Foolish of course; but none the less courageous and chivalrous. I tell you, that fellow, highwayman or no highwayman, is a real man-every inch of him.”

 
Princess Mary of Margoth was standing with her back to a window, so it is probable that none of her guests noticed that her face went from white to red and back to white again several times during Hemmington Main’s recital, or saw the moisture which gathered in her eyes, fight as she would to keep it back. A moment later she withdrew from the apartment, after summoning a lady-in-waiting and arranging for the comfort and entertainment of her American friends.

  The king was seated in his cabinet, when, as was her custom, the Princess Mary entered unannounced, Prince Stroebel was there, too, and Baron Kantchi, the Karlovian minister, with a very tall young man in the uniform of The Black Guard.

  They all rose as she entered the room; but she passed among them straight to the king as though she did not see them. Her eyes were very wide, and in them was a look of pain and terror that Alexis III had never seen there during all the short life of his little daughter.

  “Mary!” he said, “What has happened?”

  “I have just heard,” she said in a dull voice, “that you are going to have him shot tomorrow morning. It is a wicked thing and must not be done!”

  “You mean,” exclaimed the king, “that you have come here to intercede for the life of the notorious Rider-confessed cutthroat and ruffian?”

  “He is a brave man,” cried the princess. “He fought for me, and saved me, possibly, from worse than death. He deserves better at your hands.”

  “He is a criminal of the lowest type,” expostulated Alexis III. “He is a menace to society. The world will be better for his death.”

  “I do not believe that he is bad at heart,” insisted the girl. “To me and to Carlotta he was all that a noble and chivalrous gentleman should be. Imprison him if you must; but do not have him shot!”

  “My daughter,” said the king, kindly but firmly, “The Rider should be hanged; but in the indictment and sentence which was recently read to the prisoner we explained that his honorable treatment of our daughter had won him our clemency-therefore he will be shot rather than hanged. No one could ask for more for The Rider-even for you I can grant him no more.”

  “Oh, Da-da!” cried the girl, and there was a choking sob in her voice. “Please! Please!”

  But the king only took her by the hand and led her from the room, shaking his head sadly.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  PRINCE BORIS paced back and forth the narrow limits of his cell. He had discovered that by standing with his back against the bars at one side three equal paces should bring his boot in contact with the bars upon the opposite side. After a little practice he was able to measure his strides so accurately that with eyes closed he could take the three steps, and on the third have the toe of his boot just touching the bars. It was not an exciting form of diversion; but ft was better than nothing and fully as profitable as counting the upright bars which formed three sides of his cell. He was engaged in this thrilling pastime when the door at the end of the corridor opened once again.

  Prince Boris halted and strained his eyes through the darkness. He welcomed the break in the monotony of his solitary confinement, and wondered who the visitor might be and what his errand. There was but a single individual, whose light foot falls caused scarcely a reverberation in the dismal corridor. As the new comer approached Boris saw a small figure wrapped in a long, dark cloak.

  “An assassin with a dagger,” mused Prince Boris, with a grin. “I would welcome him none the less, though. The devil would be better company than none.

  Now the little figure stopped before his cell, and threw back the hood which had covered its head and face. At sight of the latter Prince Boris of Karlova gave a gasp of astonishment and delight

  “Your Highness!” he cried.

  The girl looked up into his face, so far above hers. She was very white, and Boris could see that it was with difficulty that she composed herself. “What in the world brings you to this place?” he asked.

  “Mr. Main has told me that you might free yourself if you would,” she replied, “and I have come to beg of you to speak-to tell them the thing that will liberate you, no matter how it may affect any other. I have done my best to save you; but I can do nothing -nothing. My father, the king, is determined that you shall die. Tell me, O tell me, what it is that you know which would gain your freedom for you.

  “I cannot understand,” he said, “what has brought your highness here other than a sense of honorable gratitude to one who deserves nothing but your scorn and contempt. I don’t wish to die; but I could face death, your highness, rather than tell you the thing you ask to know. I have been a fool; but I am not entirely without a sense of honor.”

  His hands gripped the iron bars which separated them. His face was pressed close in an interstice between two cold, steel rods. The Princess Mary stepped impulsively closer. She laid her two warm little hands upon his, sending a thrill tingling through every fiber of his being; but when she tried to say the thing that trembled upon her lips, she hesitated, stammered, and dropped her eyes to the rough flagging of the floor.

  “What is it?” he whispered. “What do you wish to say to The Rider?”

  “Oh, it is so hard,” she cried. “Hard, because I am what I am. Were I just a girl I might find the courage to say what I want to say; but I am a princess, muzzled, fettered and constrained by ages of hereditary pride, by silly etiquette, and senseless customs.”

  Gently he laid one of his hands upon hers.

  “Do not say it then,” he said “I would not for the world have you suffer even the slightest embarrassment on my account. Remember, your highness, who and what I am.”

  “I will say it!” she cried. “last night, just before The Guard came, when you thought that death was very near, you told me that you loved me.” She stumbled pitifully over the last three words. “If you spoke the truth then, you will speak the truth now and say the words that will free you, because-because-Oh, God have mercy on my soul!-I-you!”

  Prince Boris of Karlova trembled as the leaves of the aspen tremble to a breeze. Even though the whispered words were plain enough he could not believe that he had heard aright, yet there could be no mistake. Slowly he extended his arms through the grating of his cell and took the little figure of the Princess Mary in them; but as he bent his lips toward hers, the girl placed a palm across them and pushed him away.

  “Not that!” she gasped. “I have sunk pride and endured shame to tell you the thing I have told you; but I am still a princess-my lips are not for you even though I love you. For your sake alone I have acknowledged my love, in the hope that because of it you would speak the truth that will save your life and mitigate the misery of mine. Promise me that if I send an officer you will tell him what you will not tell me.”

  Prince Boris’ arms dropped to his sides. He turned back into his cell, his shoulders stooped like those of an old man.

  “I cannot,” he said, “for when you know, Mary of Margoth, you will hate me-I prefer death to that.”

  “You will not tell, then?” she asked.

  He shook his head. Withiout another word the girl turned and walked slowly up the corridor. The man saw the door open, saw her pass through, and saw it close behind her. Then he threw himself upon the hard bench at the back of his cell and buried his face in his hands. For the first time in his life Prince Boris of Karlova knew utter misery.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  ALL night he sat there, and there they found him when they came just before dawn to lead him to the courtyard of the prison where the blank wall is.

  At their summons he rose and shook himself, and when he stepped into the corridor between the files of soldiery his shoulders were as stiff and his chin as high as when he rode at the head of The Black Guard through the boulevards of Sovgrad. With a firm step, and a half smile upon his lips, he marched out into the chill of the early morning. An arc lamp sputtered above the courtyard close to the blank wall. He saw it and the squad of soldiers drawn up opposite, and he knew that the light was there for the purpose of rev
ealing their target to the men.

  He spoke but once as they placed him in with his back against the wall, and that was to ask that they leave his hands free and his eyes unbandaged. Then the soldiers who had brought him from his cell stepped aside; an officer asked him if he had anything to say before his sentence was carried out. Prince Boris shook his head.

  Very clearly he heard the short, sharp commands of the lieutenant in command of the firing squad. “Ready! Aim!-” Prince Boris licked his dry lips and stared very hard at the young lieutenant.

  Why did the man hesitate so long before giving the final command? The prisoner saw the officer cast an uneasy glance in the direction of a door which led from the interior of the prison into the courtyard, then he saw the door open and an officer in full uniform hurry toward them. His hand was upraised, and as he came he cried aloud: “Stop! In the name of the king, stop!”

  The newcomer exchanged a few words with the lieutenant, then he approached the prisoner.

  “You will accompany me,” he said. “His Majesty, the King, has sent for you.

  Under guard Boris was conducted to the palace, up a broad staircase and along a marble corridor at the end of which were two massive doors. At these doors his guard halted, and the officer who; had brought him from the courtyard and the stone wall advanced and struck upon the panels with his gloved knuckles. Instantly the doors swung inward, revealing to Prince Boris as astonishing a sight as he had ever witnessed.

  A dozen officers, resplendent in showy uniforms were grouped on either side of a table at which sat two elderly men. There was Prince Stroebel, and two other functionaries of Margoth, the prime minister of Karlova, Baron Kautchi, Boris’ three cronies, Alexander, Ivan, and Nicholas; the American, Hemmington Main; General Demetrius Gregovitch, Karlovian Minister of War; and a very much frightened little girl whom Boris’ astounded eyes recognized as Bakla, the barmaid of Peter’s Inn. But the one which caused the prisoner the greatest surprise by his presence there was he who sat at the table beside Alexis III of Margoth. Like a man in a trance the crown prince of Karlova stood staring at the big-fisted, red-faced man who glared at him from beneath his bushy eyebrows, and who was none other than his royal sire, King Constans of Karlova.