He would not permit another moment of wonder. He would regain his calm and
wait like a man for certainty. Thus his face wore an iron mask and his
thoughts an iron band. And presently they came to Constantinople.
But of what followed afterwards it is difficult to write. For fate struck
Paul on that warm June morning, and blasted his life, so that for many days
he only saw red, and lived in hell.
Every one knows the story which at the time convulsed Europe. How a certain
evil-living King, after a wild orgie of mad drunkenness, rode out with two
boon companions to the villa of his Queen, and there, forcing an entrance,
ran a dagger through her heart before her faithful servants could protect
her. And most people were glad, too, that this brute paid the penalty of
his crime by his own death--his worthless life choked out of him by the
Queen's devoted Kalmuck groom.
But only Paul and his father, and Mark Grigsby, know the details, which
were told in Dmitry's heart-broken letter. How that night, the 29th of May,
at the hour the Excellency was expected, he--Dmitry--was waiting in the
garden to meet him and conduct him through the gloom, when, while he stood
there under the stars, the Imperial Highness had called him softly, telling
him to take the message down to the Excellency, which he did.
Pages:
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214