Produced by Duncan Harrod, Juliet Sutherland, CharlesFranks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
THE PRINCE OF GRAUSTARK
BY
GEORGE BARR McCUTCHEON
Author of "Graustark", "Beverly of Graustark," etc.
With Illustrations by
A.I. KELLER
1914
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I MR. AND MRS. BLITHERS DISCUSS MATRIMONY
II TWO COUNTRIES DISCUSS MARRIAGE
III MR. BLITHERS GOES VISITING
IV PROTECTING THE BLOOD
V PRINCE ROBIN is ASKED TO STAND UP
VI THE PRINCE AND MR. BLITHERS
VII A LETTER FROM MAUD
VIII ON BOARD THE JUPITER
IX THE PRINCE MEETS MISS GUILE
X AN HOUR ON DECK
XI THE LIEUTENANT RECEIVES ORDERS
XII THE LIEUTENANT REPORTS
XIII THE RED LETTER B
XIV THE CAT IS AWAY
XV THE MICE IN A TRAP
XVI THREE MESSAGES
XVII THE PRODIGAL DAUGHTER
XVIII A WORD OF ENCOURAGEMENT
XIX "WHAT WILL MY PEOPLE DO"
XX LOVE IN ABEYANCE
XXI MR. BLITHERS ARRIVES IN GRAUSTARK
XXII A VISIT TO THE CASTLE
XXIII PINGARI'S
XIV JUST WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN EXPECTED
ILLUSTRATIONS
Her eyes were starry bright, her red lips were parted. _Frontispiece_
"You will be her choice," said the other, without the quiver of aneye-lash.
"I shall pray for continuous rough weather."
The dignified Ministry of Graustark sat agape.
CHAPTER I
MR. AND MRS. BLITHERS DISCUSS MATRIMONY
"My dear," said Mr. Blithers, with decision, "you can't tell me."
"I know I can't," said his wife, quite as positively. She knew when shecould tell him a thing and when she couldn't.
It was quite impossible to impart information to Mr. Blithers when hehad the tips of two resolute fingers embedded in his ears. Thathappened to be his customary and rather unfair method of conquering herwhen an argument was going against him, not for want of logic on hispart, but because it was easier to express himself with his ears closedthan with them open. By this means he effectually shut out the voice ofopposition and had the discussion all to himself. Of course, it wouldhave been more convincing if he had been permitted to hear the sound ofhis own eloquence; still, it was effective.
She was sure to go on talking for two or three minutes and then subsidein despair. A woman will not talk to a stone wall. Nor will shewantonly allow an argument to die while there remains the slightestchance of its survival. Given the same situation, a man would get upand leave his wife sitting there with her fingers in her ears; and, ashe bolted from the room in high dudgeon, he would be mean enough tocall attention to her pig-headedness. In most cases, a woman is contentto listen to a silly argument rather than to leave the room justbecause her husband elects to be childish about a perfectly simpleelucidation of the truth.
Mrs. Blithers had lived with Mr. Blithers, more or less, fortwenty-five years and she knew him like a book. He was a forcefulperson who would have his own way, even though he had to put hisfingers in his ears to get it. At one period of their joint connubialagreement, when he had succeeded in accumulating a pitiful hoardamounting to but little more than ten millions of dollars, sheconcluded to live abroad for the purpose of educating their daughter,allowing him in the meantime to increase his fortune to something likefifty millions without having to worry about household affairs. But shehad sojourned with him long enough, at odd times, to realise that, solong as he lived, he would never run away from an argument--unless, bysome dreadful hook or crook, he should be so unfortunate as to bedeprived of the use of both hands. She found room to gloat, of course,in the fact that he was obliged to stop up his ears in order to shutout the incontrovertible.
Moreover, when he called her "my dear" instead of the customary Lou, itwas a sign of supreme obstinacy on his part and could not, by anystretch of the imagination, be regarded as an indication of placidaffection. He always said "my dear" at the top of his voice and with agreat deal of irascibility.
Mr. William W. Blithers was a self-made man who had begun his career byshouting lustily at a team of mules in a railway construction camp.Other drivers had tried to improve on his vocabulary but even the muleswere able to appreciate the futility of such an ambition, and later on,when he came to own two or three railroads, to say nothing of a fewmines and a steam yacht, his ability to drive men was even morenoteworthy than his power over the jackasses had been. But drivingmules and men was one thing, driving a wife another. What incentive hasa man, said he, when after he gets through bullying a creature thatvery creature turns in and caresses him? No self-respecting mule everdid such a thing as that, and no man would think of it except withhorror. There is absolutely no defence against a creature who will rubyour head with loving, gentle fingers after she has worked you up tothe point where you could kill her with pleasure--or at least so saidMr. Blithers with rueful frequency.
Mr. and Mrs. Blithers had been discussing royalty. Up to the previousweek they had restricted themselves to the nobility, but as an event ofunexampled importance had transpired in the interim, they now felt thatit would be the rankest stupidity to consider any one short of a PrinceRoyal in picking out a suitable husband--or, more properly speaking,consort--for their only daughter, Maud Applegate Blithers, aged twenty.
Mrs. Blithers long ago had convinced her husband that no ordinary humanbeing of the male persuasion was worthy of their daughter's hand, andhad set her heart on having nothing meaner than a Duke on the familyroll,--(Blithers alluded to it for a while as the pay-roll)--, with thechoice lying between England and Italy. At first, Blithers, being anhonest soul, insisted that a good American gentleman was all thatanybody could ask for in the way of a son-in-law, and that when it cameto a grandchild it would be perfectly proper to christen him Duke--lotsof people did!--and that was about all that a title amounted to anyway.She met this with the retort that Maud might marry a man named Jones,and how would Duke Jones sound? He weakly suggested that they couldchristen him Marmaduke and--but she reminded him of his oft-repeatedboast that there was nothing in the world too good for Maud andinstituted a pictorial campaign against his prejudices by painting inthe most alluring colours the picture of a ducal palace in which thename of Jones would never be uttered except when employed in directingthe fifth footman or the third stable-boy--or perhaps a scullerymaid--to do this, that or the other thing at the behest of her Grace,the daughter of William W. Blithers. This eventually worked on hisimagination to such an extent that he forgot his natural pride andadmitted that perhaps she was right.
But now, just as they were on the point of accepting, in lieu of aDuke, an exceptionally promising Count, the aforesaid event conspiredto completely upset all of their plans--or notions, so to speak. It wasnothing less than the arrival in America of an eligible Prince of theroyal blood, a ruling Prince at that. As a matter of fact he had notonly arrived in America but upon the vast estate adjoining their own inthe Catskills.
Fortunately nothing definite had been arranged with the Count. Mrs.Blithers now advised waiting a while before giving a definite answer tohis somewhat eager proposal, especially as he was reputed to havesufficient means of his own to defend the chateau against any immediateperil of profligacy. She counselled Mr. Blithers to notify him that hedeemed it wise to take the matter under advisement for a couple ofweeks at least, but not to commit himself to anything positivelynegative.
Mr. Blithers s
aid that he had never heard anything so beautifullyadroit as "positively negative," and directed his secretary to submitto him without delay the draft of a tactful letter to the anxiousnobleman. They were agreed that a Prince was more to be desired than aCount and, as long as they were actually about it, they might as wellaim high. Somewhat hazily Mr. Blithers had Inquired if it wouldn't beworth while to consider a King, but his wife set him straight in shortorder.
Peculiarly promising their hopes was the indisputable fact that thePrince's mother had married an American, thereby establishing aprecedent behind which no constitutional obstacle could thrive, and hadlived very happily with the gentleman in spite of the critics.Moreover, she had met him while sojourning on American soil, and thatwas certainly an excellent augury for the success of the presententerprise. What could be more fitting than that the son should followin the footsteps of an illustrious mother? If an American gentleman wasworthy of a princess, why not the other way about? Certainly MaudBlithers was as full of attributes as any man in America.
It appears that the Prince, after leisurely crossing the continent onhis way around the world, had come to the Truxton Kings for along-promised and much-desired visit, the duration of which depended tosome extent on his own inclinations, and not a little on the outcome ofthe war-talk that affected two great European nations--Russia andAustria. Ever since the historic war between the Balkan allies and theTurks, in 1912 and 1913, there had been mutterings, and now thesituation had come to be admittedly precarious. Mr. Blithers was in aposition to know that the little principality over which the young manreigned was bound to be drawn into the cataclysm, not as a belligerentor an ally, but in the matter of a loan that inconveniently expiredwithin the year and which would hardly be renewed by Russia with theprospect of vast expenditures of war threatening her treasury. The loanundoubtedly would be called and Graustark was not in a position to payout of her own slender resources, two years of famine having fallenupon the people at a time when prosperity was most to be desired.
He was in touch with the great financial movements in all the world'scapitals, and he knew that retrenchment was the watchword. It would beno easy matter for the little principality to negotiate a loan at thisparticular time, nor was there even a slender chance that Russia wouldbe benevolently disposed toward her debtors, no matter how small theirobligations. They who owed would be called upon to pay, they whopetitioned would be turned away with scant courtesy. It was the privateopinion of Mr. Blithers that the young Prince and the trusted agentswho accompanied him on his journey, were in the United States solelyfor the purpose of arranging a loan through sources that could only bereached by personal appeal. But, naturally, Mr. Blithers couldn'tbreathe this to a soul. Under the circumstances he couldn't evenbreathe it to his wife who, he firmly believed, was soulless.
But all this is beside the question. The young Prince of Graustark wasenjoying American hospitality, and no matter what he owed to Russia,America owed to him its most punctillious consideration. If Mr.Blithers was to have anything to say about the matter, it would be forthe ear of the Prince alone and not for the busybodies.
The main point is that the Prince was now rusticating within what youmight call a stone's throw of the capacious and lordly countryresidence of Mr. Blithers; moreover, he was an uncommonly attractivechap, with a laugh that was so charged with heartiness that it didn'tseem possible that he could have a drop of royal blood in his vigorousyoung body. And the perfectly ridiculous part of the whole situationwas that Mr. and Mrs. King lived in a modest, vine-covered little housethat could have been lost in the servants' quarters at Blitherwood.Especially aggravating, too, was the attitude of the Kings. They werereally nobodies, so to speak, and yet they blithely called their royalguest "Bobby" and allowed him to fetch and carry for their women-folkquite as if he were an ordinary whipper-snapper up from the city tospend the week-end.
The remark with which Mr. Blithers introduces this chapter was inresponse to an oft-repeated declaration made by his wife in the shadeof the red, white and blue awning of the terrace overlooking, from itsdespotic heights, the modest red roof of the King villa in the valleybelow. Mrs. Blithers merely had stated--but over and over again--thatmoney couldn't buy everything in the world, referring directly tosocial eminence and indirectly to their secret ambition to capture aPrince of the royal blood for their daughter Maud. She had prefacedthis opinion, however, with the exceedingly irritating insinuation thatMr. Blithers was not in his right mind when he proposed inviting thePrince to spend a few weeks at Blitherwood, provided the young mancould cut short his visit in the home of Mr. and Mrs. King, who, he hadasseverated, were not in a position to entertain royalty as royalty wasin the habit of being entertained.
Long experience had taught Mr. Blithers to read the lip and eyelanguage with some degree of certainty, so by watching his wife'sindignant face closely he was able to tell when she was succumbing toreason. He was a burly, domineering person who reasoned for every onewithin range of his voice, and it was only when his wife became coldlysarcastic that he closed his ears and boomed his opinions into her veryteeth, so to say, joyfully overwhelming her with facts which it werefutile for her to attempt to deny. He was aware, quite as much so as ifhe had heard the words, that she was now saying:
"Well, there is absolutely no use arguing with you, Will. Have it yourway if it pleases you."
Eying her with some uneasiness, he cautiously inserted his thumbs inthe armholes of his brocaded waistcoat, and proclaimed:
"As I said before, Lou, there isn't a foreign nobleman, from theEmperor down, who is above grabbing a few million dollars. They're allhard up, and what do they gain by marrying ladies of noble birth ifsaid ladies are the daughters of noblemen who are as hard up as all therest of 'em? Besides, hasn't Maud been presented at Court? Didn't yousee to that? How about that pearl necklace I gave her when she waspresented? Wasn't it the talk of the season? There wasn't a Duke inEngland who didn't figure the cost of that necklace to within a guineaor two. No girl ever had better advertising than--"
"We were speaking of Prince Robin," remarked his wife, with a slightshudder. Mrs. Blithers came of better stock than her husband. Hisgaucheries frequently set her teeth on edge. She was born in Providenceand sometimes mentioned the occurrence when particularly desirous ofsquelching him, not unkindly perhaps but by way of making him realisethat their daughter had good blood in her veins. Mr. Blithers hadheard, in a round-about way, that he first saw the light of day inJersey City, although after he became famous Newark claimed him. He didnot bother about the matter.
"Well, he's like all the rest of them," said he, after a moment ofindecision. Something told him that he really ought to refrain fromtalking about the cost of things, even in the bosom of his family. Hehad heard that only vulgarians speak of their possessions. "Now,there's no reason in the world why we shouldn't consider his offer.He--"
"Offer?" she cried, aghast. "He has made no offer, Will. He doesn'teven know that Maud is in existence. How can you say such a thing?"
"I was merely looking ahead, that's all. My motto is 'Look Ahead.' Youknow it as well as I do. Where would I be to-day if I hadn't lookedahead and seen what was going to happen before the other fellow had hiseyes open? Will you tell me that? Where, I say? What's more, wherewould I be now if I hadn't looked ahead and seen what a marriage withthe daughter of Judge Morton would mean to me in the long run?" He feltthat he had uttered a very pretty and convincing compliment. "I nevermade a bad bargain in my life, Lou, and it wasn't guess-work when Imarried you. You, my dear old girl, you were the solid foundation onwhich I--"
"I know," she said wearily; "you've said it a thousand times: 'Thefoundation on which I built my temple of posterity'--yes, I know, Will.But I am still unalterably opposed to making ourselves ridiculous inthe eyes of Mr. and Mrs. King."
"Ridiculous? I don't understand you."
"Well, you will after you think it over," she said quietly, and hescowled in positive perplexity.
"Don't you t
hink he'd be a good match for Maud?" he asked, after manyminutes. He felt that he had thought it over.
"Are you thinking of kidnapping him, Will?" she demanded.
"Certainly not! But all you've got to do is to say that he's the manfor Maud and I'll--I'll do the rest. That's the kind of a man I am,Lou. You say you don't want Count What's-His-Name,--that is, you don'twant him as much as you did,--and you do say that it would be thegrandest thing in the world if Maud could be the Princess ofGrosstick--"
"Graustark, Will."
"That's what I said. Well, if you want her to be the Princess of_THAT_, I'll see that she is, providing this fellow is a gentleman andworthy of _her_. The only Prince I ever knew was a damned rascal, andI'm going to be careful about this one. You remember that measly--"
"There is no question about Prince Robin," said she sharply.
"I suppose the only question is, how much will he want?"
"You mean--settlement?"
"Sure."
"Have you no romance in your soul, William Blithers?"
"I never believed in fairy stories," said he grimly. "And what's more,I don't take any stock in cheap novels in which American heroes goabout marrying into royal families and all that sort of rot. It isn'tdone, Lou. If you want to marry into a royal family you've got to putup the coin."
"Prince Robin's mother, the poor Princess Yetive, married an Americanfor love, let me remind you."
"Umph! Where is this Groostock anyway?"
"'Somewhere east of the setting sun,'" she quoted. "You _must_ learnhow to pronounce it."
"I never was good at foreign languages. By the way, where is Maud thisafternoon?"
"Motoring."
He waited for additional information. It was not vouchsafed, so hedemanded somewhat fearfully:
"Who with?"
"Young Scoville."
He scowled. "He's a loafer, Lou. No good in the world. I don't like theway you let--"
"He is of a very good family, my dear. I--"
"Is he--er--in love with her?"
"Certainly."
"Good Lord!"
"And why not? Isn't every one she meets in love with her?"
"I--I suppose so," he admitted sheepishly. His face brightened. "Andthere's no reason why this Prince shouldn't fall heels over head, isthere? Well, there you are! That will make a difference in thesettlement, believe me--a difference of a couple of millions at least,if--"
She arose abruptly. "You are positively disgusting, Will. Can't youthink of anything but--"
"Say, ain't that Maudie coming up the drive now? Sure it is! Bygracious, did you ever see anything to beat her? She's got 'em all beata mile when it comes to looks and style and--Oh, by the way," loweringhis voice to a hoarse, confidential whisper, "--I wouldn't say anythingto her about the marriage just yet if I were you. I want to look himover first."