It was the turn of the Archduke to walk the floor of the arbor with long strides, his hands behind him, his gaze bent before him.

"Yes, civilization, progress--all material things. But the Church--you forget, _Majestat_, that your people and mine are of different faiths.

Some assurance I must have that there will be no question----"

"Willingly," said the other, rising. "Do not my people serve God as they choose? For you, if you like, the Holy Roman Empire reconstituted with you as its titular head, the sovereignty of central Europe intact--all the half formulated experiments of the West, at the point of the sword.

This is your mission--and mine!"

The two men faced each other, eye to eye, but the smaller dominated.

"A pact, my brother," said the man in the hunting-suit, extending his hand.

The Archduke hesitated but a moment longer, and then thrust forward. The hands clasped, while beside the two, the tall man stood like a Viking, his great head bent forward, his forked beard wagging over the table.

"A pact," repeated the Archduke, "which only Death may disrupt."

They stood thus in a long moment of tension. It was he they called _Majestat_ who first relaxed.

"Death?" he smiled. "Who knows? God defends the Empire. It lives on in my sons and yours."

"Amen!" said the Archduke solemnly.

"For the present," continued the other quietly, "silence! I shall advise you. You can rely upon Von Hoetzendorf?"

"Utterly. In two weeks I shall attend the grand maneuvers at Savajevo."

"Oh, yes, of course. You shall hear from me." He took a few steps toward the door of the arbor. "It does not do to stay here too long. We must join the others. Berchtold, you said, is coming?"

The Archduke nodded with a frown, and followed with the Admiral into the garden. The sun had declined and the warm glow of late afternoon fell upon the roses, dyeing them with a deeper red. But along the crimson alleys the three men walked calmly, the smaller one still gesturing with his ebony cane. Presently the sound of their footsteps upon the gravel diminished and in a moment they disappeared beyond the hedge by the greenhouses.

Renwick in his place of concealment trembled again. The reaction had come. He drew a long breath, moved his stiffened limbs and glanced at his companion. Her face was like wax, pale as death and as colorless.

Her fingers in his were ice-cold. Her eyes, dark with bewilderment, sought his blankly like those of a somnambulist. Renwick rose stiffly to his knees and peered through the bushes.

"They have gone," he muttered.

"The Archduke!" she gasped. "You heard?"

He nodded.

"Have we dreamed? I cannot believe----"

Renwick was thinking quickly. Marishka--their position--his duty--a way of escape--one thought crowded another in his mind. He glanced about through the foliage behind them and then rose to his feet.

"I must get back to Vienna, at once," he said hoarsely.

Marishka stood beside him, clinging to his arm.

"And I--I know not what to do. I could not look Her Highness in the face. But I too must go to Vienna. I am not versed in politics, but the secret that we share is terrible. It oppresses me. Austria--my country!"

She hid her face in her hands and stood silent a moment, in the throes of a struggle, still trembling violently. At the touch of Renwick's fingers upon her arm, she straightened, lowered her hands, her face now quite composed.

"I too must leave here at once," she said quietly. "I have an allegiance stronger than my duty to Sophie Chotek. I am going----"

"Where?" he asked.

"To Schonbrunn."

"But Marishka, have you thought----?"

"I pray that you will waste no words. As you love me, Hugh, you will do what I ask and be silent."

"What can I do?"

"Go with me to Vienna tonight."

"That would be most imprudent. Your reputation----"

"I care nothing. Will you accompany me?"

Renwick shrugged. "Of course."

"Then do as I bid you. I will show you a way out to a small gate from the garden by which you can reach the public road. Go to your Inn. Make arrangements for an automobile. I will join you tonight." She peered in all directions through the foliage and then led the way through the bushes in a direction opposite to that by which they had come. Renwick followed silently, his mind turbulent. What was his duty? And where did it conflict with Marishka's mad plan? What would his Ambassador have wished him to do? And in what could he serve England best? He must have time to think. For the present at least Marishka should have her way.

Indeed, had he wished, he saw no means of dissuading her. He would go with her to Vienna, make a clean breast of things to his Chief, before Marishka could carry out her plan. After that the matter would be out of his hands.

The girl descended some steps to a narrow gate in the hedge. Here Renwick paused a moment to clasp her in his arms.

"Beloved," she whispered, "not now. Go. Follow the path to the wall. You must climb it. Let no one see you descend. Au revoir. God be with you."

And she was gone.

CHAPTER II

COURT SECRETS

Hugh Renwick lay flat upon the coping of the wall for a moment peering up and down the road until sure at last that the way was clear, when he let himself down and walked rapidly in the direction of the village. The events of the last hour were of a nature to disturb the equanimity of an existence less well ordered than his. The winning of the Countess Marishka, an achievement upon which he had set his whole soul for many uncertain weeks in which hope and fear had fought a daily battle in his heart--that in itself had been enough to convince him that the gods looked upon him with favor--but this other _coup de foudre_! Whatever the means by which his information had been obtained, the mere possession of it and the revelation of it to his Ambassador was a diplomatic achievement of the highest importance. There had long been rumors of an _entente_ between Archduke and Kaiser, but _this_! He rubbed his eyes to make sure that he was awake.

Hugh Renwick was merely the average Englishman of good family and wealth, who because of his education in a German university had found the offer of the post of Vienna singularly attractive. He had filled his position with circumspection, if not with brilliancy, and had made himself sufficiently popular in court circles to be sure that if not a triumphant success in the drudgery of the office, he was at least not altogether a social failure. Good looking, wealthy, talented though he was, it was something indeed to have won Marishka Strahni, who, apart from her high position in Vienna and the success of a season, was, as he well knew, the finest girl in all Austria. Even yet he doubted his good fortune. He had come to Konopisht, where the girl was visiting the Duchess of Hohenberg, who had been a childhood friend of her mother's.

As everyone in Vienna knew, Sophie Chotek was ineligible for the high position she occupied as consort of the Heir Presumptive. Though a member of an ancient Bohemian family, that of Chotek and Wognin, the law of the Habsburg's that archdukes may marry only those of equal rank, forbade that the Duchess of Hohenberg and her children should share the position of husband and father. She had been snubbed upon all the occasions of her appearance at court functions, and had at last retired to the Archduke's estates at Konopisht, where she led the secluded life of the _ebenburtige_, still chafing, rumor had it, and more than ever jealous and ambitious for the future of the children.

Upon the occasion of a previous visit of the Countess Marishka to Konopisht, Renwick had spent a week end at the castle, but he thanked his stars that he was now stopping at the village inn. It would have been difficult to go through the formality of leave-taking with the shadow of this impending tragedy to Europe hanging over him. He pitied Marishka from the bottom of his heart for he had seen the beginnings of the struggle between her devotion to the Duchess and her duty to her sovereign. But he knew enough of her quality to be sure that she would carry out her plan at whatever the cost to her own feelings.

As Renwick approached the gates which led into the Castle grounds, he had an actual sense of the consequence of the Archduke's guests in the appearance of soldiery and police which were to be seen in every direction, and while he waited in the village road two automobiles came out of the gate and dashed past him in the direction of the railroad station, in the foremost of which he recognized Archduke Franz and his guests of the rose garden.

"The roses of Konopisht," he muttered, thinking of Marishka's fatalism.

"Were they symbols, those innocent red blossoms?" And then with an inward smile, "Marishka! What bitterness could the roses of Konopisht bring between Marishka and him?"