Weighed in the Balance Read online

  “You dislike her,” Rathbone observed mildly.

  She laughed, her face seemingly transformed, but the relentless anger was only just behind the amusement. “I loathe her. But that is beside the point. It does not make what I say true or untrue….”

  “But it will prejudice a jury,” he pointed out. “They may think you speak from envy.”

  She was silent for a moment.

  He waited. No sound penetrated from the office beyond the door, and the traffic in the street had resumed its steady noise.

  “You are right,” she admitted. “How tedious to have to consider such logicalities, but I can see it is necessary.”

  “Gisela, if you please. Why should she wish to murder Friedrich? Not because he was for independence, even at the cost of war?”

  “No, and yet indirectly, yes.”

  “Very clear,” he said with a whisper of sarcasm. “Please explain yourself.”

  “I am trying to!” Impatience flared in her eyes. “There is a considerable faction which would fight for independence. They need a leader around whom to gather—”

  “I see. Friedrich—the original crown prince! But he abdicated. He lives in exile.”

  She leaned forward, her face eager.

  “But he could return.”

  “Could he?” Again he was doubtful. “What about Waldo? And the Queen?”

  “That’s it!” she said almost jubilantly. “Waldo would fight against it, not for the crown but to avoid a war with Prussia or whoever else was first to try to swallow us. But the Queen would ally with Friedrich for the cause of independence.”

  “Then Gisela could be queen on the King’s death,” Rathbone pointed out. “Didn’t you say that was what she wanted?”

  She looked at him with gleaming eyes, green and brilliant, but her face was filled with exaggerated patience.

  “The Queen will not tolerate Gisela in the country. If Friedrich comes back, he must come alone. Rolf Lansdorff, the Queen’s brother, who is extremely powerful, is also for Friedrich’s return, but would never tolerate Gisela. He believes Waldo is weak and will lead us to ruin.”

  “And would Friedrich return without Gisela, for his country’s sake?” he asked doubtfully. “He gave up the throne for her once. Would he now go back on that?”

  She looked at him steadily. Her face was extraordinary; there was so much force of conviction in it, of emotion and will. When she spoke of Gisela it was ugly, the nose too large, too long, the eyes too widely spaced. When she spoke of her country, of love, of duty, she was beautiful. Compared with her, everyone else seemed ungenerous, insipid. Rathbone was quite unaware of the traffic beyond the window, the clatter of hooves, the occasional call of voices, the sunlight on the glass, or of Simms and the other clerks in the office beyond the door. He was thinking only of a small German principality and the struggle for power and survival, the loves and hates of a royal family, and the passion which fired this woman in front of him and made her more exciting and more profoundly alive than anyone else he could think of. He felt the surge of it run through his own blood.

  “Would he go back on that?” he repeated.

  A curious look of pain, pity, almost embarrassment, crossed her face. For the first time she did not look directly at him, as though she wished to shield her inner feelings from his perception.

  “Friedrich has always believed in his heart that his country would want him back one day and that when that time came, they would accept Gisela also and see her worth—as he does, of course, not as it is. He lived on those dreams. He promised her it would be so. Every year he would say it yet again.” She met Rathbone’s eyes. “So to answer your question, he would not see returning to Felzburg as going back on his commitment to Gisela but as returning in triumph with her at his side, vindicating all he had ever believed. But she is not a fool. She knows it would never be so. He would return, and she would be denied entrance, publicly humiliated. He would be astounded, dismayed, distraught, but by then Rolf Lansdorff and the Queen would see to it that he did not renounce a second time.”

  “You believe that is what would have happened?” he asked quietly.

  “We shall never know, shall we?” Zorah said with a curious, bleak smile. “He is dead.”

  The impact of it shook Rathbone suddenly and forcibly. Now murder did not seem so unreasonable. People had been killed for immeasurably less.

  “I see,” he said very soberly. “That does make a very strong argument which a jury of ordinary men from any street would grasp.” He folded his hands into a steeple and leaned his elbows on the desk. “Now, why should they believe it was the unfortunate widow who committed murder, and not some follower of Prince Waldo or of any other German power who believes in unification? Surely they also have powerful motives? Countless murders have been committed for the gain or loss of a kingdom, but would Gisela really kill Friedrich rather than lose him?”

  Her strong, slender fingers grasped the arms of the leather chair as she leaned forward towards him, her face intent.

  “Yes!” she said unwaveringly. “She doesn’t care a fig about Felzburg, or any of us. If he returns now, renouncing her—whether it was by his own will or by coercion is immaterial; the world won’t know or care—then the whole dream crumbles, the great love story falls apart. She is a pathetic, even ridiculous figure, a woman abandoned after twelve years of marriage, no longer in her first youth.”

  Her face sharpened, her voice grew husky. “On the other hand, if she is widowed, then she is the great figure of domestic tragedy again, the center of admiration and envy. She has mystery, allure. And she is free to offer her favor to admirers or not, as long as she is discreet. She goes down in legend as one of the world’s great lovers, to be remembered in song and story. Who would not in their hearts envy that? It is a kind of immortality. Above all, one remembers her with awe, with respect. No one laughs. And of course,” she added, “she has his private fortune.”

  “I see.” He was convinced in spite of himself. She had his total attention, his intellect and his emotion. He could not help imagining the passions which had moved the Prince at first, his overwhelming love for a woman, so intense he had sacrificed a country and a throne for her. What must she be like? What radiance of character, what unique charms, had she to inspire such a love?

  Was she something like Zorah Rostova herself, so intensely alive she awoke in him dreams and hungers he had not even realized he possessed? Did she fill him with vitality also, and make him believe in himself, see in a wild glance all that he could be or become? What sleepless nights had he spent, struggling between duty and desire? How had he compared the thought of a life devoted to the court—the daily, endless formalities, the distance which must inevitably surround a king, the loneliness of being without the woman he loved—and the temptation of a life in exile with the constant companionship of such an extraordinary lover? They would grow old together, separated from family and country, and yet never alone. Except for the guilt. Did he feel guilt for having chosen the path of his longing, not his duty?

  And the woman. What choices had she faced? Or was it for her simply a battle, win or lose? Was Zorah right, had Gisela wanted desperately to be queen—and lost? Or had she only loved the man and been prepared to be painted the villainess by her country as long as she could love him and be with him? Was she now a woman whose life was ended by grief? Or was it a circumstance brought about by her own hand, either as the only alternative to being left, the very public end of the great royal romance, not in the grand tragedy of death but in the pathetic anticlimax of being deserted?

  “So you will take my case?” Zorah said after several minutes.

  “Perhaps,” he said cautiously, although he could feel an excitement of challenge wakening inside him, a breath of danger which he had to admit was exhilarating. “You have convinced me she may have had a reason, not yet that she did.” He steadied his voice. He must appear cool. “What evidence have you that Friedrich indeed intended to
return, even given Queen Ulrike’s stipulation that he leave Gisela to do it?”

  She bit her lip. Anger flickered across her face, then laughter.

  “None,” she admitted. “But Rolf Lansdorff was there that month, at the Wellboroughs’ house, and he spoke frequently with Friedrich. It is reasonable to suppose he put it to him. We can never know what Friedrich would have said had he lived. He is dead—is that not enough for you?”

  “To suspect, yes.” He too leaned forward. “But it is not proof. Who else was there? What happened? Give me details, evidence, not emotion.”

  She looked at him long and levelly.

  “Who was there?” She raised her eyebrows slightly. “It was late spring. It was a country house party at the home of Lord and Lady Wellborough.” Her mouth twisted in a wry, amused smile. “Not a suspect. Lord Wellborough manufactures and deals in guns. A war, any war, except in England, will suit him very well.”

  Rathbone winced.

  “You asked for realism,” she pointed out. “Or does that fall into the category of emotion? You seem to feel some emotion, Sir Oliver.” Now there was mocking amusement plain in her eyes.

  He was not prepared to tell her the repugnance he felt. Wellborough was an Englishman. Rathbone was profoundly ashamed that any Englishman should be happy to profit from the killing of people, so long as it did not touch him. There were all manner of sophisticated arguments about necessity, inevitability, choice and liberty. He still found the profit in it repellent. But he could not tell this extraordinary woman this.

  “I was playing the part of the jury,” he said smoothly. “Now I am counsel again. Continue with your list of guests, if you please.”

  She relaxed. “Of course. There was Rolf Lansdorff, as I have said before. He is the Queen’s brother, and extremely powerful. He has considerable disdain for Prince Waldo. He considers him weak, and would prefer Friedrich to return—without Gisela, naturally. Although I am not sure if that is for reasons of his own or because Ulrike would not tolerate it, and she wears the crown, not he.”

  “Or the King?”

  Now her smile was genuinely amused, close to laughter.

  “I think it is a long time, Sir Oliver, since the King went against the Queen’s wishes. She is cleverer than he, but he is clever enough to know it. And at present he is too ill to fight for or against anything. But what I meant was that Rolf is not royalty. And close as he is, there is all the difference in the world between a crowned head and an uncrowned one. When the will is there and the fight is real, Ulrike will win, and Rolf has too much pride to begin a battle he must lose.”

  “She hates Gisela so much?” He found it hard to imagine. Something very deep must lie between the two women that one would hate the other sufficiently to refuse her return, even if it meant the possible victory of those who favored independence.

  “Yes, she does,” Zorah replied. “But I think you misunderstand, at least in part. She does not believe that Gisela would add to the cause. She is not a fool, nor a woman to put personal feelings, no matter what they are, before duty. I thought I explained that. Did you doubt me?”

  He shifted position slightly.

  “I believe everything only provisionally, ma’am. This seemed to be a contradiction. Nevertheless, proceed. Who else was there, apart from Prince Friedrich and Princess Gisela, Count Lansdorff, and, of course, yourself?”

  “Count Klaus von Seidlitz was there with his wife, Evelyn,” she resumed.

  “His political position?”

  “He was against Friedrich’s return. I think he is undecided about unification, but he does not believe that Friedrich would resume the succession without causing great upheaval—and possibly civil division, which could only be to our enemies’ advantage.”

  “Is he correct? Might it produce civil war?”

  “More guns for Lord Wellborough?” she said quickly. “I don’t know. I think internal disunity and indecision might be more likely.”

  “And his wife? Has she loyalties?”

  “Only to the good life.”

  It was a harsh judgment, but he saw no softening of it in her face.

  “I see. Who else?”

  “The Baroness Brigitte von Arlsbach, whom the Queen originally chose for Friedrich before he renounced everything for Gisela.”

  “Did she love him?”

  A curious look crossed her face.

  “I never thought so, although she has never married since.”

  “And if he left Gisela, might he in time have married her, and she become queen?”

  Again the idea seemed to amuse her, but it was a laughter that showed awareness of pain.

  “Yes. I suppose that is what would have happened if he had lived, and gone home, and Brigitte had felt it her duty. And she might have, to strengthen the throne. Although possibly he would have found it politic to take a younger wife so that he might produce an heir. The throne must have an heir. Brigitte is now nearer forty than thirty. Old, for a first child. But she is very popular in the country, very admired.”

  “Friedrich has no children with Gisela?”

  “No. Nor has Waldo.”

  “Waldo is married?”

  “Oh, yes, to Princess Gertrudis. I would like to say I dislike her, but I cannot.” She laughed self-mockingly. “She is everything I think I detest and find irretrievably tedious. She is domestic, obedient, pleasant-tempered, becomingly dressed and handsome to look at, and civil to everyone. She always seems to have the appropriate thing to say—and says it.”

  He was amused.

  “And you think that tedious?”

  “Incredibly. Ask any woman, Sir Oliver. If she is honest, she will tell you such a creature is an affront to ordinary nature.”

  He immediately thought of Hester Latterly, independent, arbitrary, opinionated, definitely short-tempered when she perceived stupidity, cruelty, cowardice or hypocrisy. He could not imagine her being obedient to anyone. She must have been a nightmare to the army when she served in its hospitals. All the same, he found himself smiling at the thought of her. She would have agreed with Zorah.

  “Someone you are fond of has come to your mind,” Zorah cut across his thoughts, and again he felt the color mount up his face.

  “Tell me why you still find yourself liking Gertrudis,” he said somewhat irritably.

  She laughed with delight at his predicament.

  “Because she has the most marvelous sense of humor,” she replied. “It is as simple as that. And it is very difficult not to like someone who likes you and who can see the absurd in life and enjoy it.”

  He was obliged to agree with her, although he would rather not have. It was disturbing; it threw him off balance. He returned abruptly to his earlier question.

  “What does Brigitte wish? Does she have allegiances, desires for independence or unification? Does she want to be queen? Or is that a foolish question?”

  “No, it is not foolish at all. I don’t think she wishes to be queen, but she would do it if she felt it her duty,” Zorah replied, all laughter vanished from her face. “Publicly, she would have liked Friedrich to return and lead the fight for independence. Personally, I think she might have preferred he remain in exile. It would then not have placed on her the burden and the humiliation of having to marry him, if that proved to be what the country wanted.”

  “Humiliation?” Her remark was incomprehensible. “How can marrying a king, because you are beloved of the people, be a humiliation?”

  “Very easily,” she said sharply, a stinging contempt at his obtuseness in her eyes. “No woman worth a sou would willingly marry a man who has publicly sacrificed a throne and a country for someone else. Would you wish to marry a woman who was half of one of the world’s great love stories, when you were not the other half?”

  He felt foolish. His lack of perception opened up in front of him like an abyss. A man might want power, office, public recognition. He should have known a woman wanted love, and if she could not have the
reality, then at least the outer semblance of it. He did not know many women well, but he had thought he knew about them. He had tried enough cases involving women at their most wicked or vulnerable, passionate or cold-blooded, innocent or manipulative, clever or blindly, unbelievably silly. And yet Hester still confused him … at times.

  “Can you imagine being made love to by someone who is making love to you because it is a duty?” Zorah continued mercilessly. “It would make me sick! Like going to bed with a corpse.”

  “Please!” he expostulated vehemently. One moment she was as delicate in her perception as the touch of a butterfly, the next she said something so coarse as to be disgusting. It made him acutely uncomfortable. “I have understood your argument, madam. There is no need for illustration.” He lowered his tone and controlled it with difficulty. He must not allow her to see how she rattled him. “Are those all the people who were present at this unfortunate house party?”

  She sighed. “No. Stephan von Emden was there as well. He is from one of the old families. And Florent Barberini. His mother is distantly related to the king, and his father is Venetian. There is no purpose in your asking me what they think, because I don’t know. But Stephan is an excellent friend to me, and will assist you in my case. He has already promised as much.”

  “Good!” he said. “Because, believe me, you will need all the friends and all the assistance you can acquire!”

  She saw that she had annoyed him.

  “I’m sorry,” she said gravely, her eyes suddenly soft and rueful. “I spoke too bluntly, didn’t I? I only wanted to make you understand. No, that is not true.” She gave a little grunt of anger. “I am furious over what they would do to Brigitte, and I desire you to come out of your masculine complacency and understand it too. I like you, Sir Oliver. You have a certain aplomb, an ice-cool Englishness about you which is most attractive.” She smiled suddenly and radiantly.

  He swore under his breath. He hated such open flattery, and he hated still more the acute state of pleasure it gave him.

  “You wish to know what happened?” she went on imperturbably, settling a little back in her seat. “It was the third day after the last of us arrived. We were out riding, rather hard, I admit. We went across the fields and took several hedges at a gallop. Friedrich’s horse fell and he was thrown.” A shadow of distress crossed her face. “He landed badly. The horse scrambled to its feet again, and Friedrich’s leg was caught in the stirrup iron. He was dragged several yards before the animal was secured so we could free him.”