CHAPTER XXVIII.
“I CANNOT LEAVE MY COUNTRY.”
The black tragedy of the night had scored its mark deep on Colonel Petrosch, and I shall not readily forget the look of high-wrought strain which his face wore. All the lines had deepened; the eyes shone with unnatural brilliance, the sockets were sunken, and the face skin had that dead steely colour which comes after hours of fierce and passionate tension.
He looked as though he had lived ten years in as many hours, and knew himself to be still confronted by uncontrollable dangers full of the menace of utter ruin and incalculable disaster.
Twice before I had seen such a look on men’s faces. Once in the case of a reckless Westerner who, in the teeth of warning, started a forest fire only to see it spread with fierce violence down upon his own homestead, menacing his wife and children and all he had in the world, and barring the path of rescue with a wall of impassable flame. The other was a millionaire who, in a desperate plunge to double his millions, was caught by the market, and had to look on helplessly while he and his friends were beggared in a day.
And I read Petrosch’s look now to mean that he had helped to set in motion this wild revolt and was shocked by the violence already done and appalled by the prospect of what might yet have to follow.
I was glad to find it so. He might prove to be in a better mood to judge on its merits the effort I had made to save Gatrina. There had been enough horrors already to glut his anger; and he looked to the future with apprehension genuine enough to render him willing to prevent the commission of more.
He greeted Gatrina and me very formally, as he and Major Kireef took their seats at the table.
“You have incurred a fearful responsibility, Mr. Bergwyn,” he began. “Major Kireef has told me the facts. You have taken an unwarrantable course in attempting to thwart the army’s purpose, and have used means which are inexcusable.”
“They were the only means I could find to use.”
“You have compromised yourself and all with you; you have opposed the soldiers when carrying out the army’s orders, and have subjected them to gross ill-treatment, in order that you might obtain disguises for your purpose. And in doing this, you have committed acts for which you must have known you would have to answer. I can see neither excuse nor palliation for such conduct.”
I made no reply to that tirade. I judged that he had not taken the trouble to come at such a time merely to lecture me on the heinousness of my conduct; and as I cared nothing for what he said, and only for what he meant to do, I let him talk.
“You yourself see there is no answer,” he continued; and went on to condemn at considerable length with much detail the enormity of my offences, until I began to be perplexed as to his motive. He couldn’t have made the thing worse had he been going to order my instant execution.
I guessed at length, however, that his real object was to make me appreciate the extreme difficulty of the task I had set him to get me out of the mess. But the harangue had a very different effect upon Gatrina. The blacker he made my conduct appear and the more vividly he painted the danger in which I stood, the greater was her manifest agitation; and when he declared with very stern and significant deliberation that at such times men had lost their lives who had done less than I, I resolved to try and stop him.
“It will save time, Colonel Petrosch, if you are going to order me to be shot, to have it done at once,” I said. “I am not in the least ashamed of a single thing I have done, except that I blundered and failed.”
“Do I understand you to mean, Mr. Bergwyn,” he cried, very sternly, “that you would have me report to my colleagues that in the face of all I have said you take pride in having set their authority at defiance?”
A hot retort rose to my lips, but just before it passed, I caught his meaning and paused to consider my reply.
“No, I don’t mean that. I recognise their authority fully. In so far as my actions have involved an apparent defiance of that authority, I must, of course, regret them.”
“It would be impossible for the army to take any but the sternest view of such acts, when committed by one who is avowedly their enemy.”
“You know better than anyone in Belgrade whether I am to be classed as an enemy, Colonel. I am quite prepared to recognise their authority in the country; although feeling nothing but the strongest aversion from the hopeless deeds by which it has been enforced.”
“These are no concerns of yours, sir.”
“Except as they are the concerns of humanity. I do not set up to be the judge of their acts: the world will do that. I am a stranger and a foreigner, and speak as one; no more. God send that the after consequences may prove in some sort the justification for what has been done.”
“That is the prayer of us all,” he answered, very solemnly, speaking out of that secret fear which possessed him.
A pause followed which Gatrina broke to ask: “Has any blood been shed beside that of the King and Queen, Colonel Petrosch?”
“Madam, I cannot speak of these matters with you,” he replied, brusquely. “I came for other purposes—one of them to find a way if I can to place you out of—of the reach of harm.” His hesitation over the last phrase was significant; but the declaration gave me intense and unbounded satisfaction.
“I will deal with your case first, Mr. Bergwyn. May I take it that you regret your defiance of the army, and are prepared now to submit yourself unconditionally to their authority?”
“Unconditionally? What does that mean?”
“That you will not again attempt to dispute it.”
“I am prepared to express my regret and to recognise their authority.”
“That is the same thing,” he said. It was not, of course, but I concluded he needed some kind of assurance from me; and when I had given it, he conferred in an undertone with Major Kireef. Then he rose. “I must speak with you in private, Mr. Bergwyn;” and he led me to another room.
As soon as we were alone he took my hand and wrung it.
“You have caused a great deal of trouble, but personally I thank you for what you have done. I believe you have saved the Princess’s life; and God knows there have been too many taken.”
“What has occurred?”
“The King and Queen are dead; the Queen’s brothers have been shot; several of the members of the Government have also fallen; and the Princess was to have shared the same fate, because of her succession claims. But it may be possible to save her now.”
“Possible only?”
“I used the term advisedly—possible. It must depend upon the course of events to-day. Why did you not prevail upon her to leave the country or at least seek some place of safety?”
“You forget. You told me nothing of the imminence of these horrors.”
“When I saw you I did not know myself. I helped to raise the storm, but when once it broke it was ungovernable.”
“What will happen to-day?”
“Who can tell? The army holds the power; and we believe from what we have already seen that the people will stand behind us to a man. The city has already broken out into rejoicings, and the soldiers are cheered everywhere. But a mob is as fickle as a summer breeze; and if a change comes over them, nothing can save a conflict which may deluge the city, aye, the whole country with blood. I am dazed when I think of it.”
“And the Princess?”
“I would not answer even for your safety, Mr. Bergwyn; nor even for my own; to say nothing of hers. But I hope all will be well. The leaders of the army have had their fill of horrors; and if the day finds the people supporting them, this night will have seen the last of these measures of despair. God give that it may be so,” he cried with impressive earnestness.
“Let us get to details,” I said after a pause. I was terribly anxious again. “What do you advise?”
“That you leave Belgrade at once for a time. Let me carry an expression of your regret back with me, and a pledge that the matter of the loan will be considered as soon as the new Government is established. You have acted in a way that, had you been other than you are, the army would never have forgiven; but when once the present fever is past, there is no one who would think of dealing harshly with the man who can render the assistance you can. But much must depend on what happens later to-day when the facts about the night’s doings at the Palace are published. Therefore I say, go for the time.”
“And the men who were with me?”
“Are they known?”
“I think not. They were not arrested.”
“Then no inquiries will be made; but it would be safer for them also to leave for a time.”
“And now the great question—the Princess?”
He paused and looked at me. “Would she leave with you?”
“Would she be allowed to leave?”
“She would be allowed to escape,” he answered. “If she remains, she will be placed in confinement; and if the army’s plans go right, she will be sent out of the country. The Queen’s sisters have been placed in similar confinement; and they too will be liberated and exiled unless trouble comes. If that happens, the Princess would be again in imminent peril. She would be a menace to the only real solution of the crisis—the change of dynasty. And the army have given stern enough proofs of its resolve in that matter. It has already decided upon the future King—Peter Karageorgevics.”
“Can I speak to her alone?”
“Yes! tell her what I have just said; and if you have any influence with her use every shred of it to prevail upon her to go. You will be doing not only her a service but the country also. I will return in an hour or so to learn the result.”
“If she refuses to go?”
He threw up his hands. “There will be only one course open.”
“Arrest?”
“Arrest, yes; with all its possibilities.”
I went back then to Gatrina, and her eyes fastened upon my face instantly, full of apprehensive questioning anxiety. I looked probably as grave as I felt; the Colonel’s last words having made me fully alive to the vital issues which depended upon the coming interview; and her anxiety deepened into fear as I took my seat without speaking.
An orderly came in almost directly with a message for the major, who went out, and then we two were alone again.
“About yourself?” asked Gatrina, eagerly, as the door closed behind them.
“I have no longer anything to fear. All that the Colonel said was for the other man’s benefit, I think. I am free to leave Belgrade when I will; and indeed he urged me to do so at once.”
“I am glad—so glad,” she answered, with a wan smile and a sigh of relief. “He succeeded in frightening me. I did not realise before he spoke so, all you risked in this. I have been thinking while you were with him, and I see it now.”
“I don’t think there was ever any real risk of trouble. I had his promise from the outset to do all he could for me; and of course there were other reasons.”
“No risk, you say, after the conduct of that awful man whom poor old Chris attacked?”
“Ah, poor old dog. How we shall miss him. Yet he could not have given his life for a better cause. If we ever come back to Belgrade, I’ll have a reckoning with that bully.”
She noticed that “we.” She glanced sharply at me, and appeared as if to be going to speak of it, but stopped. “What has occurred at the Palace?”
“The news is about as black as it can be;” and I told her all that Petrosch had said to me. I was relieved to see that although she was deeply and indeed intensely affected, her grief was less poignant than before. Finding this, I dwelt with emphasis upon the position of the Queen’s sisters; until she understood my purpose.
“You are speaking of what you think will be my lot,” she said.
“Yes. I don’t wish to alarm you, but I know that that is what will be done—with this difference: that if the opposition to the army takes any active form, your danger will be greater even than theirs.”
“I am not afraid.”
“No one thinks that; and I should be the last to think it.”
“It is my duty to remain at whatever risk.” She was very firm, very dignified, very much the Princess as she said this.
“Do you wish the Throne?”
“Do you mean am I ambitious to rule? No, no, a thousand times no. I am not fit for it. I am more a woman than a Princess; but I cannot think of myself.”
“If you could think of yourself what would you do?”
“Is it altogether idle? As a woman, you are barred from the succession by yourself. Even if your claims were admitted, you would have to marry someone who as your husband would be accepted by the nation as King; but he, not you, would be the ruler—even if the army were not bent upon changing the dynasty and had not already chosen their King.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, Colonel Petrosch has told me;” and I repeated the message he had authorised me to deliver.
“He told you to tell me that?”
“Yes, expressly and authoritatively.”
“Why?”
“I think that you should see quite clearly the wisdom of adopting the course which will help the army leaders and so serve the country.”
“You mean that I should play coward and run away. He set you to tempt me?”
“Is it a temptation?”
She thought earnestly and then exclaimed; “I cannot go. I cannot.”
It was not now “I will not;” and I was glad to note the difference.
“If you could think of yourself what would you do?” I asked again.
“I answer as I did just now—why put that idle question to me?”
I paused and then plunged.
“Because—I love you, Gatrina.”
“No, no, no; any answer but that; give any reason but that,” she cried, as the red flushed into her cheeks till they flamed, and she sank back in her seat and hid them from me with her trembling hands.
I knelt by her side.
“It is the truth, Gatrina; why should I not say it? Once before our hearts spoke. You remember that day on the hill at Samac. We knew it then; what need to hide it now? It is all in all to me. What is it to you?”
“No, no, no,” she murmured hurriedly. She was trembling violently. “It is impossible. It is impossible. I told you then.”
“That is just what it is not now, whatever it may have seemed then. It is true I am only a——”
“Hsh!” Just a whisper and a hand laid impulsively upon mine, and a glance of reproach from tender, loving eyes.
I closed my hand on hers and held it.
“Well, only Bourgwan then,” I said, and she smiled. “If you could think for yourself....” I began again.
“No,” she whispered. “Don’t tempt me. You make it so hard for me.”
“It must be as you decide,” I pleaded. “But the world holds no other woman for me than you.”
At that she started, drew her hand away quickly, and bit her lip. “I had forgotten,” she murmured.
I read her thought. It was of Elma’s lie. “In that you did me grave wrong. I had no thought but for you in coming here; and none in staying. You might have trusted me after that day at Samac.”
“I did not mistrust you. I thought only of your——” she hesitated in sudden embarrassment.
“Let all be clear now between us, Gatrina. We may never meet again or we may never part again—as you decide it. The stake is too great for us to risk it all for the lack of plain words. I know what is in your thoughts; but on my honour it was never for an instant in mine, and never could be. Do believe that.”
“I thought you felt it would be impossible for us—oh, it is so difficult.”
“Then put your hand in mine again and I shall know the slander is understood.”
“It is still impossible, Bourgwan,” she whispered. “I am so sorry;” and as is in pity for the pain I must feel she gave me her hand again.
“If you could think for yourself only?”
“God knows I would so gladly do as you wish.”
It was sweet but yet sad hearing.
“I do wish it and do press it, not for my sake only but for yours,” I urged.
“I cannot, Bourgwan; I cannot leave my country.”
“That is final?” I asked, looking into her eyes.
“You make it so hard for me. I cannot. I cannot.”
I lifted her hand and pressed my lips to it. I had failed; and with a heavy sigh rose and went back to my seat, with a feeling of blank desolateness.
“I have grieved you,” she said gently when I had sat silent some while. “And you have done so much for——”
“Not that, please,” I interposed, forcing a smile.
“I can never forget it,” she replied. “We shall not meet again, as you said; but I can never forget it.”
“May I ask one thing? If matters go with you so that you should ever have to leave the country, may I seek you again?”
“It is all sad for you—and for me, too, you know that—but it is kinder, if harder, not to give you groundless hope.”
“I shall never cease to hope.”
“I shall never leave my country,” she answered, earnestly.
“I am answered, but not convinced,” I replied, in quite as earnest a tone as hers; and then, to lighten the strain, I smiled and added: “If you will not leave it, I may have to leave mine and turn Serb.”
“I should have at least one loyal subject then, I am sure.”
As the words left her lips, the door opened and Colonel Petrosch returned.