Page:McClure's Magazine v9 n3 to v10 no2.djvu/152

878 eyes and chattering teeth; he seemed to recognize the invisible speaker. Count Staumn looked over his shoulder at the assemblage with an expression that plainly said, "What am I to do?"

"In the fiend's name," hissed Baron Brunfels, taking the precaution, however, to speak scarce above his breath, "if you are so frightened when it comes to a knock at the door, what will it be when the real knocks are upon you? Open, Count, and let the insistent stranger in. Whether he leave the place alive or no, there are twenty men here to answer."

The count undid the fastenings and threw open the door. There entered a tall man, completely enveloped in a dark cloak that was dripping wet. Drawn over his eyes was a hunter's hat of felt, with a drooping, bedraggled feather on it. The door was immediately closed and barred behind him, and the stranger, pausing a moment when confronted by so many inquiring eyes, flung off his cloak, throwing it over the back of a chair; then he removed his hat with a sweep, sending the raindrops flying. The intrigants gazed at him speechless, with varying emotions. They saw before them his Majesty, Rudolph, King of Alluria.

If the king had any suspicion of his danger, he gave no token of it. On his smooth, lofty forehead there was no trace of frown and no sign of fear. His was a manly figure, rather over than under six feet in height; not slim and gaunt like Count Staumn's, nor yet stout to excess like that of Baron Brunfels. The finger of time had touched with frost the hair at his temples, and there were threads of white in his pointed beard, but his sweeping mustache was still as black as the night from which he came. His frank, clear, honest eyes swept the company, resting momentarily on each; then he said in a firm voice, without the suspicion of a tremor in it:

"Gentlemen, I give you good evening; and although the hospitality of Count Staumn has needed spurring, I lay that not up against him, because I am well aware his apparent reluctance arose through the unexpectedness of my visit; and if the count will act as cup-bearer, we will drown all remembrance of a barred door in a flagon of wine, for, to tell the truth, gentlemen, I have ridden hard in order to have the pleasure of drinking with you."

As the king spoke these ominous words, he cast a glance of piercing intensity upon the company, and more than one quailed under it. He strode to the fireplace, spurs jingling as he went, and stood with his back to the fire, spreading out his hands to the blaze. Count Staumn left the bolted door, took an empty flagon from the shelf, filled it at the barrel in the corner, and, with a low bow, presented the brimming measure to the king.

Rudolph held aloft his beaker of Burgundy, and as he did so spoke in a loud voice that rang to the beams of the ceiling:

"Gentlemen, I give you a suitable toast. May none here gathered encounter a more pitiless storm than that which is raging without."

With this he drank off the wine, and, inclining his head slightly to the count, returned the flagon. No one, save the king, had spoken since he entered. Every word he had uttered seemed charged with double meaning, and brought to the suspicious minds of his hearers visions of a trysting-place surrounded by troops and the king standing there playing with them as a tiger plays with its victims. His easy confidence appalled them. When first he came in, several who were seated remained so, but one by one they rose to their feet, with the exception of Baron Brunfels, although he, when the king gave the toast, also stood. It was clear enough their glances of fear were not directed towards the king, but towards Baron Brunfels. Several pairs of eyes beseeched him in silent supplication, but the baron met none of these glances, for his gaze was fixed upon the king.

Every man present knew the baron to be reckless of consequences, frankly outspoken, thoroughly a man of the sword, and a despiser of diplomacy. They feared that at any moment he might blurt out the purport of the meeting, and more than one was thankful for the crafty ex-chancellor's planning, who, throughout, had insisted there should be no documentary evidence of their designs, either in their houses or on their persons. Some startling rumor must have reached the king's ear to bring him thus unexpectedly upon them. The anxiety of all was that some one should persuade the king that they were merely a storm-besieged hunting-party. They trembled in anticipation of Baron Brunfels's open candor, and dreaded the revealing of the real cause of their conference. There was now no chance to warn him: a man who spoke his mind, who never looked an inch beyond his nose,