The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection. George Fraser MacDonald

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СКАЧАТЬ to play me false in the end, he wouldn’t have hesitated to raise the stakes; the fact that he didn’t suggested he might be going to level after all.

      “You’re no pauper, you know,” chuckled Rudi, damn him.

      I sat like a man undecided, and then I cried:

      “I’ll do it, then.”

      “Good man!” cries Rudi, and clapped me on the back. “I swear you’re one after my own heart!”

      De Gautet shook my hand, and announced that they were damned lucky to have such a resolute, resourceful, cool hand in the business with them; Kraftstein brought me another glass of brandy and pledged me; even Bersonin deserted his post at the door and joined in the toast. Bismarck, however, said no more than “Very good. We will begin our further preparations tomorrow,” and then took himself off, leaving me with the four jacks in the pack. They were all affability now; we were comrades in fortune, and jolly good fellows, and they did their best to get me gloriously fuddled. I didn’t resist; I was shaking with the strain and in need of all the fortifying liquor I could get. But through all their noisy bonhomie and back-slapping one thought kept pounding in my brain; oh, Jesus, in the soup again; how in God’s name shall I get out this time?

      You can guess how much sleep I had that first night at Schönhausen. Well liquored as I was when Bersonin and Kraftstein helped me to bed and pulled my boots off, my mind was all too clear; I lay there, fully clothed, listening to the wind whining round the turrets, and watching the candle shadows flickering on the high ceiling, and my heart was pumping as though I had run a race. The room was dank as a tomb, but the sweat fairly ran off me. How the devil had it all happened? And what the devil was I to do? I actually wept as I damned the folly that had ever made me come to Germany. I could have been safe at home, pleasuring myself groggy with Elspeth and sponging off her skinflint father, facing nothing worse than the prospect of bear-leading her family in Society, and here I was imprisoned in a lonely castle with five dangerous lunatics bent on dragooning me into a hare-brained adventure that was certain to put my head in a noose. And if I resisted, or tried to escape, they would wipe me out of existence as readily as they would swat a fly.

      However, as usual, once I had cursed and blubbered myself empty, my mind started searching for some ray of comfort—anything to cling to, for if you are coward enough your vainest hopes can be magnified beyond all reason. Six weeks, Bismarck had said, before this impossible wedding—say five weeks or a month at least before my substitution for Carl Gustaf had to take place. Surely much could happen in that time. Clever and wary as they were, Bismarck’s gang couldn’t watch me all the time—in four weeks there must be a moment when such a practised absconder as myself could cut and run for it. A horse, that was all I needed, and a look at the sun or the stars, and I was confident that my terror could outstrip Bismarck’s vengeance. God knew how far away the frontier was, but I was willing to wager my neck that I could reach it faster than any rider living. My neck, of course, was exactly what I would be wagering.

      With these jolly musings I passed the night, imagining a score of madcap means of escape—and as many nightmares in which Bismarck caught me in the act. It was all a waste of time, of course; within me I knew that anyone who could plot as subtly as he had done wasn’t going to give me the ghost of a hope of escaping. And I had a shrewd suspicion that if a chance did arise, I’d be too funky to take it. These fellows would stop at nothing.

      They proved it, too, on my first morning at Schönhausen.

      The great oaf Kraftstein summoned me at dawn, and I was pulling on my boots when Rudi strode in, very fresh and whistling cheerfully, rot him.

      “And did your highness sleep well?” says he. “I trust your highness is sufficiently rested after your journey.”

      I told him sourly that I wasn’t in a mood for his comedy.

      “Oh, no comedy at all,” says he. “High drama, and unless you want it to develop into tragedy you’ll act as you’ve never acted before. From this moment you are His Highness Prince Carl Gustaf, blood royal and Lord’s anointed. Do you follow me? You speak German, and nothing else—your Danish we’ll take care of presently—and you will comport yourself as a member of the Danish ruling house.”

      “Talk sense,” I growled. “I don’t know how.”

      “No, but we’re going to teach you—your highness,” says he, and for once his eyes had no laughter in them. “So. The first thing is to make you look the part. All right, Kraftstein.”

      And then and there, despite my protests, Kraftstein sat me in a chair and set to work, first cropping my hair and whiskers, and then soaping and shaving my skull. It was a long and unpleasant process, and when it was done and I looked in the glass I could have burst into tears. The ghastly creature with his great, gleaming dome of a skull was a horrid parody of me—my face, surmounted by a naked convict head.

      “Damn you!” I burst out. “Damn you! You’ve ruined me!”

      I expected them to mock me, of course, but neither twitched so much as a muscle.

      “Your highness will be under the necessity of shaving your head daily,” murmured Rudi. “Kraftstein will instruct you. Now, may I suggest that your highness wears uniform today?”

      They had that, too; rather a trim rig, I had to admit, in bottle green, which fitted me perfectly and would have given me a fine dashing air if it hadn’t been for that bald monstrosity above the collar.

      “Admirable,” says Rudi, standing back from me. “May I compliment your highness on your appearance?”

      “Drop that, blast you!” I snarled at him. “If I have to play your damned game, you’ll spare me your infernal nonsense until it starts, at least. I’m your prisoner, ain’t I? Isn’t that enough for you?”

      He waited a moment, and then says, in exactly the same tone:

      “May I compliment your highness on your appearance?

      I stood glaring at him, on the point of swinging my fist into his impassive face, but he just stared me down, and I found myself saying:

      “All right. If you must—all right.”

      “Very good, your highness,” says he gravely. “May I respectfully suggest that we go down to breakfast. I find that Schönhausen gives one a rare appetite—the country air, of course. Will you lead on, Kraftstein?”

      I wasn’t hungry, but Rudi attacked his food in good spirits, and chattered away throughout the meal. He treated me with a nice blend of familiarity and respect, and you would never have guessed if you had seen us that it was all a sham. He was a splendid actor, and although it would have made me feel a complete fool if I hadn’t been too miserable to mind, I began to realise even then that there was method in what he was doing. Kraftstein just put his head down and gorged, but on the one occasion he addressed me, he too called me “highness”.

      Bismarck came in just as we were finishing, and he for one wasn’t playing charades. He stopped dead on the threshold, though, at sight of me, and then came into the room slowly, studying my face, walking round me, and examining me carefully for a minute or more. Finally he says:

      “The likeness is astounding. In effect, he is Carl Gustaf.”

      “So your friends have been trying to convince me,” I muttered.

      “Excellent. It is not quite perfect, though. Two СКАЧАТЬ