The Tin Princess Read online

  It took Becky a few moments to realize what he was saying, and then she hated him at once. She couldn't help remembering that this was the man who'd been responsible, however indirectly, for her father's death; and she hated him, too, for his deliberate snub to Adelaide, in not deigning to speak to her until last, after a mere interpreter. And she was tired and hungry, and she knew she shouldn't be doing it as soon as she began, but she couldn't help it.

  She said: "Your Majesty is very gracious. But I am Razkavian myself, and my mother always told me that however poor our country might be in some things, it was rich in courtesy and kindness. I am glad to have the chance of learning about those qualities from the example of Your Majesty."

  And she swept the deepest curtsy she could manage, until her nose nearly touched the carpet. She was aware of the Countess frozen by her side, of the Count bristling with anger, of the Prince trembling, but mainly of Adelaide standing alert and puzzled beside her; and she looked up to see an ancient coldness in the eyes of the King.

  It was a long stare, which she returned; and then he waved her aside and turned to Adelaide. He looked her up and down once or twice and then spoke, and Becky translated as the Countess had told her, in a quiet voice and as swiftly and unobtrusively as she could, keeping close to their own words.

  He said: "So this is the bride my son has chosen."

  Adelaide replied: "I am honoured to meet Your Majesty."

  "Your family name was Bevan, I believe. Tell me about your family."

  "My mother was a seamstress, Your Majesty. She died in the workhouse at Wapping. My father was a recruiting sergeant, but I never saw him. That's all I know."

  She spoke plainly. The King's face, as Becky translated, was stony; only his fingers, fluttering more freely than ever, betrayed what he was feeling.

  Then he went on, "They tell me you have become a princess."

  "I have become the wife of a prince. But that's all I can choose to do. If it's someone else's wish to make me a princess, I shall try to be a good one, for his sake."

  A long pause then, filled with the crackle of wood in the hearth and the chime of midnight from the mantel-clock. The King's fingers fluttered more intensely once, twice, three times, as he tried to lift his right arm and failed. Becky realized that he must have suffered some kind of apoplectic seizure, and that in fact he was very old, and very ill.

  But he managed to move his left arm and pat the cushion next to him. Looking at Adelaide, he said gently, "Come and sit beside me," and for a confusing second he reminded Becky of her own dear grandfather, and she had to struggle to control her voice as she translated. So Adelaide sat next to the King, and he sent for wine. When it was poured the King took a glass and with enormous effort handed it to Adelaide in his shaking hand, without spilling a drop, and then took another himself.

  "Adelaide," he said. "That is a good name. It is like our eagle, our Adler. Did you see the Red Eagle flying over the Rock? I thought that in time my son Wilhelm would have carried the banner from the Cathedral to the Rock, but our Heavenly Father decided otherwise. So be it. Rudolf is worthy. Make sure he does not slip, Adelaide."

  He took only a sip of wine, and then sat silently beside her for a minute or so, holding her hand. Then he heaved a sigh which seemed to rack him painfully, and flicked a glance at his son.

  The Prince understood, and took away the stool from under the old man's foot and helped him to stand up.

  Adelaide stood as well, and the King stooped to kiss her gently.

  "Goodnight, Adelaide," he said.

  He said goodnight to the Prince and to the Count and Countess, and the major-domo took his arm to help him away. Becky was conscious of a deep, deep blush spreading up from her neck to the roots of her hair, but she knew she had to speak to him.

  "Your Majesty," she began, and he stopped, and she curtsied once more. "I'm extremely sorry, sir. I was very rude to you, and I beg your pardon."

  She couldn't face him. After a short pause he said, "Goodnight, child. When you see your mother again, give her my thanks."

  Then step by tiny shaking step he left the room. A servant closed the door.

  Chapter Six

  EAGLES AND BIRDLIME

  Becky was right about Jim, in one respect at least: he considered himself the equal of anyone, in a rough-and-ready democratic way. The company of stable-boys and pickpockets was familiar to him, and so was the company of artists, and actors, and earls; but he'd never seen a royal court before, and he was fascinated.

  Early in the morning of their first full day in Razkavia, he was summoned to the office of the Chamberlain. Baron Godel was the head of the Royal Household, the man responsible for the smooth running of all the ceremonies and receptions, for making all the household appointments, for administering the Royal accounts. Jim entered his office with curiosity.

  The Baron was a man in his fifties; pale, with a face whose skin was loose and pouchy, pale eyes that bulged, and teeth that sloped backwards like a rat's. He was so strikingly ugly that Jim instantly felt sorry for him. Then he noticed the look in Godel's eye: the man was well aware of the effect his appearance had, and was watching to see how he'd react. A little ripple of triumph seemed to flick itself like a fish and dart away into the glaucous moistness of his eyes. Then Jim saw the fastidious care with which the man was dressed: the faultless cut of his coat, the spotless white of his collar, the glossy black of his hair, brushed so tightly that it seemed pasted to his skull. The man was vain as well as ugly; that was interesting.

  "Herr Taylor," the Chamberlain said, without asking him to sit down. "I understand that His Royal Highness has appointed you to his service in a private capacity. Of course, I should not wish to interfere with his arrangements. But I must inform you that you have no position whatsoever in the Royal Household. His Royal Highness's office is fully staffed; there is a full complement of domestic servants; his safety is carefully watched night and day by the Palace Guard. You understand what I am saying? There is no job for you here, no position for you to fill, there will be no salary. His Royal Highness has informed my office that he wishes you to be accommodated with the servants. The room you slept in last night is required by one of my secretaries. No doubt they will find you somewhere else if you ask in the Steward's Office. Your duties and your reimbursement are a matter for His Royal Highness to settle himself; all I require is that you conduct yourself in an appropriate manner while you are in the Palace, and that you do not impede any of the work of the Household. Good day to you."

  "Good day," said Jim, and left.

  So that was how the land lay. Still, it might have been worse; Godel could have tied him down with a hundred petty duties, leaving him no time to do what he was really there for.

  Which was what, exactly?

  The Prince didn't know. Like a child, he'd trustingly attached himself to the nearest friendly presence, just as he'd married Adelaide because she was kind to him. He expected Jim to protect him, but he also expected Jim to know what to protect him from, and how to go about it. It wasn't entirely for Adelaide's sake that Jim felt obliged to do it, for he liked the Prince; the fellow was no more than a bewildered child, but one who wanted to do his duty, whatever that was. He was like Pierrot in the harlequinade: moonstruck, innocent, a tender lover too simple for the world. Which left Jim as the crafty servant, with the task of extracting him from danger.

  Not a bad role to play, all things considered. But it meant that Jim would have to get the measure of the place first: this wasn't home territory. So after a long day spent arguing with the Steward's Office and installing himself in a narrow little room in the servants' attic, above Becky's more comfortable room on the floor below, Jim decided to look round; and early in the evening, he put on a snappy tweed suit, his rat-catcher's cap and a dark-green necktie, and sauntered off towards the centre of the city.

  It was a curious place, Eschtenburg: half German and half Bohemian, half medieval and half baroque, half up-to-date and r
ational and half plain barmy. On the western side of the river were the Palace, the Government buildings, the banks and embassies and hotels, the University and the Cathedral. On the eastern side, clustered around the rock where the Red Eagle flew, was the Old Town, and a more insanitary, creaking, tottering stew of a place Jim hadn't seen anywhere in Europe - at least, not since they'd knocked down the slums around Seven Dials to make room for Charing Cross Road. In the oldest parts there weren't even any streets: the buildings were all jumbled together. According to one tale, the houses would give themselves a shake overnight and turn up somewhere quite different in the morning. According to another, the mists from the river played tricks with the appearance of things: they dissolved statues, they altered house names, they etched new designs into doorposts and window-frames.

  Jim, intrigued, intended to stroll across one of the handsome old bridges and see if he got lost, but before he got that far, he was tempted into a cellar in the University quarter by the richest smell of grilled sausages and beer that he'd ever met. There was music in there, too: trombones in a hearty polka. It was too much to resist, so he pushed open the door and went down the steps.

  The cellar was a narrow, smoky little place, and most of the customers were students. They wore a uniform, a semi-military tunic and narrow trousers, with shoulder flashes and ribbons in their lapels to indicate which fraternity they belonged to. There were about eighty or ninety of them in a space that would have been snug with thirty. A brass band with fat red faces gleamed and oompahed on a tiny platform at the end of the room, and through the fug of cigar smoke Jim saw on the walls enough antlers and stuffed animals to populate a small forest.

  He wedged himself into a corner, ordered some wurst and sauerkraut and a mug of beer, and found he'd picked about the best spot in Eschtenburg to learn about politics, for no more than six feet away there was a furious quarrel going on.

  The subject seemed to be the Royal Family and their attitude to the German question. One student, in a uniform with red-and-black shoulder flashes, was banging the table and ranting in a harsh monotone above all the rest of the noise. His eyes were wild, his face was white, and there were unpleasant flecks of foam at the corners of his mouth - never the sign of a fellow Jim would want to pass the time with.

  He was being yelled on by the red-and-blacks, and trying to shout them down was a smaller number of students in green and yellow. Jim was trying to make out what the speaker was saying when the serving-girl brought his beer, about half a gallon by the look of it, in a handsome earthenware mug with a pewter lid. He lifted it to drink and suddenly got a shove in the back that sent about a pint of froth on to the sawdust floor.

  "Ach! Mein Herr! I beg your pardon - damn you, Reiner! Make room, can't you? Allow me to buy you some more beer, sir -"

  Jim turned to see a stocky, curly-haired student with bright blue eyes, who was struggling to heave his way in and sit down. He was one of the green-and-yellow brigade.

  "Nothing spilt," said Jim, "except foam."

  "Then I shall buy you some more foam. You are English?"

  "Jim Taylor," offering a hand. "And who are you?"

  "Karl von Gaisberg, student of philosophy. I am sorry you have to suffer the ranting of those mystical Hegelians - like Glatz over there," and he pointed to the speechmaker.

  "What's he saying?" said Jim. "Did I hear the phrase blood and iron? That's Prince Bismarck's line, isn't it?"

  Karl von Gaisberg made an expression of disgust. "Moonshine. There's a group of students who worship Bismarck and all things German. Race and blood and the holy destiny of Greater Razkavia. Contemptible rubbish, if you ask me."

  "So you're on the side of Prince Rudolf and democracy, eh?"

  "Absolutely!" said von Gaisberg. "He's not perfect, but our only chance lies with him. These people would rush us into the arms of Bismarck; fatal. Even Franz-Josef would be better than that."

  Since that was roughly Daniel Goldberg's angle, and since Karl von Gaisberg seemed the kind of cheerful, noisy, careless, honest fellow Jim liked anyway, he called for two more beers; and while Jim ate his sausages and sauerkraut, Karl told him a little more about the background to the argument.

  "Who's this Leopold he's mentioned once or twice?" Jim asked.

  "Prince Leopold. The King's eldest son..."

  "I thought that was Wilhelm, the Crown Prince who was assassinated?"

  "Leopold was his elder brother. Dead too, many years ago. But there was something strange about his death - there was a scandal that was hushed up. You don't hear him mentioned now; it's as if they wanted to forget him. Glatz and his crew have seized on the idea of Leopold as a sort of lost leader, you know, betrayed by cowards and traitors... It's a good ploy; they don't have to face reality at all."

  The foam-flecked orator had reached a pitch of frenzy by now that was holding most of the crowd. Jim listened closely, and tried to make out what he was saying, but his harsh scream made it difficult.

  Then someone shouted, "But you don't want a Razkavian king! You want a German puppet!"

  "It's a lie!" shrieked Glatz. "I want a pure Razkavian royalty! A royalty worthy of Walter von Eschten - not this mincing down of a prince and his English whore!"

  Those words fell into a silence. Even the band had wheezed to a halt. Everyone was still; and then Jim pushed his plate away and stood up.

  He began to remove his jacket. Karl von Gaisberg whispered, "Down, you crazy Englishman! Glatz is a good swordsman - he'll run you through -"

  Jim felt a little twitch of triumph as all eyes turned to him, and simultaneously cursed himself for a zany; he'd come out to spy, not to play D'Artagnan.

  "What are you doing?" sneered Glatz. "This is nothing to do with you. You are a foreigner. Keep out of Razkavia's quarrels."

  "You're wrong," said Jim. "In the first place, you've just said something about an English lady which demands an answer. In the second place, even if I am a foreigner, I'm Prince Rudolf's man through and through. So if these other gentlemen will accept my help, I'm happy to offer it."

  And he rolled up his sleeves, to cheers and the banging of tables from the green-and-yellows, to whistles and catcalls from the red-and-blacks. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the band hastily packing their instruments away, and knew the fun was about to begin. And then Glatz leant across the table and slapped his face with an open palm.

  In the next fraction of a second Jim could see the whole sequence that was meant to follow: the formal challenge, the seconds, the choice of weapons, the medical attendants - and Jim carried away with a fatal puncture. Not for the first time in his life, he thanked the gods he wasn't born a gentleman. He shot out a fist and punched Glatz squarely on the nose.

  The man fell like a log, and then there began the best melee Jim had seen since the night he was thrown out of the Rose and Crown after a dispute over the 2,000 Guineas. Tables overturned, benches crashed, pots of beer flew like cannon-balls. These Razkavians were hearty fighters, and Jim could see from the fury in the narrow cellar that an ugly quantity of passion had been building up for a long time. It might have been tricky, but in a wild scrap like that, a natural street-hardened hoodlum had the advantage over the most scientifically trained gentleman; and he left the first three red-and-blacks stunned and dazed after only half a minute or so before standing back to look for the next batch.

  Then he saw Glatz, nose bleeding like a standpipe, belabouring a fallen green-and-yellow. Jim kicked his legs away, and was about to attend to him more closely when he heard a noise he recognized. Policemen sounded the same the world over: heavy feet in boots, whistles, a banging on the door; and the best way to deal with them was to vanish at once. He grabbed his jacket, seized von Gaisberg's arm, and hauled him towards the kitchen. The stout serving-girl hopped out of the way like a flea, and then they were in a dark little yard, then an alley, and then a kind of park with ornamental cherry trees, where they collapsed on a bench. Karl was laughing helplessly.

 
; "Did you see Glatz's face when you hit him? He couldn't believe it! And Scheiber - when he jumped on the bench and the other end flew up and hit Vranitzky on the jaw - marvellous! Well, Mr Taylor," he went on, "you're a good fighter, whatever else you do. But who are you? And what's your interest in Prince Rudolf?"

  Jim mopped the wound in his hand, which had opened up again. The moon was shining brightly enough to show him the student's tousled curls and bright eyes, the rents in his tunic, the loose shoulder-flash. There was a rumble of traffic from the streets of the capital all around them, and across the river, which gleamed like pewter, the great Rock loomed high with the Adlerfahne hanging still under the stars. Jim made up his mind.

  "All right, I'll tell you," he said. "It began in London, ten years ago..."

  He told von Gaisberg everything, from Adelaide's first appearance as a little haunted shadow of a thing with the fragrance of Holland's Lodgings about her to the old King's acceptance of her the night before, of which he'd had a full account from Becky.

  The student sat astounded. When Jim had finished, Karl slapped his knee, leaned back on the bench, and gave a long whistle.

  "I don't need to tell you I've taken a risk," Jim said, "telling you all this. But I've seen the way you fight, and I don't think it'll harm the Prince's interest for you to know the whole truth. There are going to be all kinds of rumours - Glatz had got hold of one already - and the damnable thing is, some of them are true. She does come from the lowest slums in London; she can barely read or write. At the same time she's as tough as you like, she's warm and shrewd and clever, and she'll fight for the Prince till she drops.

  "So there you are. That's your Princess, and that's what I'm doing here in her service. Can I count on you?"

  Without a second's hesitation, Karl von Gaisberg was pumping his hand, and vowing to bring all the Richterbund, as the green-and-yellow faction was called, to the defence of the Prince and Princess.

  "I'll hold you to that," said Jim, as the Cathedral clock struck midnight. It was then that he realized that most of the excellent sausages and almost all the beer had been used as missiles before he'd consumed them, and he was mighty hungry. A scrap always had that effect on him. In London he'd have found a coffee stall or strolled along to Smithfield, where the chop-houses did a roaring trade in the small hours for the meat-porters. But he wasn't so familiar with Eschtenburg, and when he asked Karl about somewhere to eat, the student shook his head.