Читать книгу The Uncrowned King - Baroness Orczy - Страница 14

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Should you ever go to Baden-Baden these days, remember to take a short walk, following the avenue with the fashionable shops that are so very attractive until you come to the Leopold’s Brücke. Turning your back on the Kurhaus you can then cross the bridge and linger a few moments in order to look along the exquisite vista of the Lichtenthal Allée, with its fine old trees and rich parterres of flowers. If you then look to your right you will see, on the slope of the hill, a number of villas nestling coquettishly in bosquets of trees. Their names will bring to your mind pleasant memories of distinguished people who owned or rented them in the palmy days of Baden-Baden, before M. Louis Blanc’s roulette wheels and baccarat tables were banished from Germany by Imperial government decree and found refuge and a warm welcome on the shores of the Mediterranean. You will note, among others, the Villa Augusta and the Villa Metternich, the Villa Rossini and, curiously enough, the Villa Montecarlo, which name must surely have been prophetic, as Monte Carlo had not yet been thought of those days.

Tucked away more snugly than any of the others, the Villa Elisabeth is to-day hardly visible from the road: only its red-tiled roof still peeps discreetly above a grove of flowering chestnut trees, now grown to a great size. But in the middle of last century its terraces afforded gorgeous views over the river, the valley and the distant mountains. It was rented every year about this time by an elderly lady and her son, whose names were officially given as M. le Prince de Bourbon and Mme la Princesse, but it was an open secret that M. le Prince was none other than the rightful King of France, Louis XIX by the grace of God, grandson of the martyred King Louis XVI and of Marie Antoinette; own son, in fact, of that most tragic personage in all history, the Dauphin of France, otherwise Louis XVII. Enthusiastic royalists, not only in France but all over Europe, knew well enough that the Dauphin was rescued from the Temple prison, by an anonymous hero and brought to Austria; they also knew that he lived to middle age, that he married a lady of Spanish birth and had a son, who, in their eyes, and before God, became after his father’s death, King of France by right divine.

But in the fashionable French coterie which was always very conspicuous at Baden-Baden—they pronounced it Badenne-Badenne—these facts, true or false, gave no one a headache. Napoléon III was now firmly established on the Imperial throne; Paris under his reign and the sway of Eugénie had become so brilliant that no one wished to be troubled with royalist pretenders and legitimist claims to the throne of France. There had been pretenders already whose claims were as fantastic as their personality was unkingly, so why worry about this one, who was probably as unauthentic as the others? But the society butterflies—male and female—were nevertheless sufficiently interested in Louis de Bourbon, as he was officially called, to make him welcome in their intimate circles.

“Why not?” remarked on one occasion the lovely Duchesse de Mouchy, who was known to be very exclusive in her choice of acquaintances. “One cannot be so particular when one drinks purgative water at Badenne-Badenne as one is in Paris or in one’s own château.”

And for the past four or five years Louis, King or no King, had been one of the most popular figures in the fashionable world of the chic watering-place. He was affable; he was well-bred and did not overdo the airs and graces of a reigning sovereign. The ladies liked him because he was young and good-looking—the image of his mother, so said the frequenters of that lady’s salon—and had a certain grand air about him, distinctly reminiscent of the Bourbons. He had slender aristocratic hands, with which he liked to pinch a rosy cheek now and then or tweak a shell-like ear. He was not averse to hearing a naughty story whispered by a pretty woman’s lips; knew how to turn a neat compliment to a lady, or silence with an epigram any ribald remark as to his royalist pretensions. The fact that he was obviously delicate in health only added to his attractions, for his face, innocent of moustache or fashionable whiskers, was of an interesting pallor, and he had the listless manner of a pampered invalid. He looked well on a horse, played a good game of whist and was quite a good dancer. In a word, M. le Prince de Bourbon, as some persisted in calling him, or His Majesty the King of France, as his intimates insisted, was undoubtedly a social success. He was seen on most days—when the weather was fine—in the Kurhaus or the Trinkhalle, and most evenings either at the opera or in the gaming-rooms, where he played high and lost with unruffled good humour, always impeccably dressed, always charming to the ladies and amiable with the men. “Pity,” the latter said, “that owing to his pretensions he is not allowed to live in France. He would be a great asset in Parisian society.”

On the other hand, in his own salon in the Villa Elisabeth, Louis was King of France and nothing less. Perhaps this was due to his mother’s influence. Under her eye he observed the most rigid etiquette. On occasions he held formal receptions, when he would receive his guests sitting on a high, gilt chair that looked very like a throne. The ladies filed past him and swept their curtsies right down to the floor, their voluminous crinolines billowing round them like balloons, while the bows which the men made before him were not unlike genuflexions and partook more of reverence than of simple courtesy. They wore their decorations and some came in full-dress uniform. It was considered a great privilege to kiss the royal hand.

On those occasions Madame, the King’s mother, sat beside him on a chair placed slightly lower than his. Though past middle age she was still a very handsome woman; a marvel of dignity combined with graciousness. She was that rare and beautiful thing, a fair Spaniard; her hair, which was turning grey, showed signs of having been a warm coppery gold. But her eyes were real Spanish eyes, dark, velvety, and must, in youth, have been very alluring. She spoke French with a marked Spanish accent.

Who she was by birth nobody knew. In vain did patrician fingers turn over the pages of the Almanach de Gotha; the worthy compiler of that social Bible was cryptic on the subject. “Louis XVII,” he says in Part I of the Almanach, “King of France and of Navarre, only s. of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette of Austria. B. 1785. Suc. his father 1793. M. 1833 Inez di Gama, widow of Sir Mark Bertrand, captain in the English army, and has one son.” Of Inez di Gama and Sir Mark Bertrand, not another word, nor did any of Madame’s friends know anything for certain.

Friends? Madame la Princesse de Bourbon had very few friends. Only one person was ever admitted to what might be termed her intimacy. This was Count Friesen, who was chancellor at the Austrian Embassy in Paris under Prince Metternich. He often came over to Baden-Baden during the summer season, whenever he was on leave, and was a frequent visitor at the Villa Elisabeth.