The weekly salon of Countess Christina of Burlesdon and Ortenburg in the British embassy became a social centre of Munich so quickly that it quite took James’s breath away. Christina had been a notable member of Bavarian court society for a good six years on their marriage, so her contacts were already extensive. This was not why James had been attracted to her. That had been more to do with her confident demeanour and the dryness of her humour, as well of course as her looks.
The Ortenburgs were ancient nobility of the Empire, but their religious convictions had made them to some extent outsiders within Bavaria. This ran against the grain for Christina, who rather liked the political gossip, music and whirl of a Munich soirée. Marriage to an English milord hardly affected her outsider status, but his wealth, quite as extensive as common gossip held it to be, certainly did. James happily allotted a budget sufficient for any social purpose she had in mind, and encouraged her in it.
So Christina’s Thursday salon attracted all Munich: politicians, soldiers, artists, writers, musicians and poets. She presided over the occasions as a confident and amused queen, much to James’s pleasure at her happiness. Consequently, each Thursday afternoon his secretaries were swamped by a deluge of political gossip, so much so that James instituted a Friday morning debriefing for his staff to process and assess it all. The dispatches from Munich to Whitehall became more and more bulky and comprehensive as a result.
Another consequence of his marriage was that James spent rather more time than he so far had travelling the electorate in order to visit Christina’s many relatives. As a result the springs and chassis of his coach and six took some punishment from Bavaria’s indifferent roads, and he got rather more experience than he wanted of the intellectual poverty of the electorate’s aristocracy. Fortunately, many of his new relatives were as passionate about guns, hounds and horses as he was. So ‘Milord Burlesdon’ was generally reckoned a good fellow and Christina was thought to have done very well for herself. The post-marital tour of her German relatives also brought him for the first time in his life across the border and into Ruritania.
The Ortenburgs had made several marriages over the past century with the Ruritanian German house of Ganzheim, whose properties lay across the border on the southern fringe of the great forest of Zenda. So as April approached and the country dried out, the Burlesdon equipage headed east from Munich along some less than satisfactory roads to enter the duchy of Mittenheim from the south. On Maundy Thursday 1774 the coach lurched into the busy market town of Grossbrückenheim on the river Ebrendt, beyond which were the green and wooded hills of southern Ruritania. They stopped for a late lunch, which Frank Potts had ridden ahead and ordered from the town’s principal inn. The ‘Grüner Drache’ was a traditional half-timbered edifice, with a galleried inner yard. The landlord had however observed the world’s expectations were changing. He had constructed a suite of handsome panelled dining rooms beyond the public taproom which, as the man explained, did a fine business delivering dinners to a range of local groups and societies.
‘These days, your excellency, some people like privacy and quiet when they dine. And my cook makes sure they have food they can appreciate, as I hope you will discover. He’s an Austrian who studied his craft in Paris.’ He indicated the taproom, which at that time of the day was quiet enough. ‘Old King Henry the Lion actually dined in this old barn on several occasions in my grandfather’s day when he passed through with the court to and from Mittenheim. We still keep up the old custom of putting up the shields of arms of our noble patrons. I hope you won’t consider it an indignity to have the arms of er ... Rassendyll ... displayed alongside those of Elphberg above the counter there, if it please your excellency.’
‘Not in the least, good fellow,’ James replied with a smile. ‘I’d find it strangely appropriate.’
The lunch was quite as good as the landlord promised. ‘I think I shall have another glass of the wine, James,’ said the countess. ‘It’s a fine red from the Taveln valley. You must try it. I’ll make a note for Herr Abentauer to get in some for the embassy cellar. It’s rich enough to serve in small glasses at our receptions.’
‘Ah my dear, I recall it’s a Thursday. And there’s no salon for you today! But then it’s a feast of the Church, so nobody would have turned up anyway. Hah! Is this why you chose Holy Week for our tour of your Ruritanian relatives? It’s otherwise a waste of a Thursday.’
His wife sniffed, not that she minded the teasing. ‘It is a pity. Last week’s meeting was an unexpected success. Professor Weishaupt from Ingolstadt was quite the sensation. I was pleased with his little lecture on Moral Reformation. He’s gaining a following in Munich. I was so glad of the recommendation from dear Baroness Wollherz. We must have him back next month.’
‘Edward Dunbar is very enthusiastic about Weishaupt’s theology,’ James commented. ‘For a supposedly Catholic academic the professor seems to appeal to Protestants strangely.’
‘It’s about Rationality, James. If people are happy they are good, and they can only be happy by enlightening the mind, which will banish superstition and prejudice. Who can argue with that?’
‘Nobody, I suppose, my dear. It’s just that how his audience defines “superstition” might get the good professor into trouble. The elector’s agents might take an interest in such views.’ He changed the subject. ‘I had a letter from Heinz Elphberg before we left. I’m expected to attend on his royal highness at the new château of Zenda while we’re staying with the Ganzheims. He’s resident there for Easter with our ... his aunt.’
The countess gave a little smile. They did not discuss James’s relationship to the Elphberg royal family explicitly, but she liked making a knowing game of it in conversation. ‘The Princess Osra Madeleine? I would so like to meet her. She is such an admired woman.’
‘Rightly so, my dear. She’s doing wonders as regent of Glottenburg, restoring the finances and rebuilding the capital. Her grandson’s education won’t be as neglected and deficient as the late duke’s was. I hope you get a chance to meet her some time.’
***
On Easter Monday James rode over to Zenda from his new brother-in-law’s estate at Saptenburg, which was under the eaves of the great forest and only five miles from the royal castle. Christina’s sister’s husband, the Baron Klaus von Ganzheim zu Saptenburg, had proved to be the most congenial of his new relatives James had so far met. He and the baron had spent a delightful afternoon walking the estate and inspecting the excavations of an ancient Roman frontier town and silver mine the baron was sponsoring.
Frank Potts rode along with his employer to Zenda. ‘I have a feeling we’ll be visiting Saptenburg again, sir,’ he commented.
‘Klaus is excellent company and Christina and her older sister are great friends,’ James agreed. ‘The household is Catholic so there was even the chance for us to take communion at the high feast in the family chapel. All in all, I have to say my first impressions of Ruritanian society are very favourable.’
‘And now we ascend to a different level of Ruritanian society, my lord. I’m hoping Freddie Winslow will be at Zenda with the prince. We have some catching up to do.’
The approach to the royal domain from the south was along a wide forest road, with not much to see beyond the trees that hemmed them in, and nobody to encounter other than the occasional forester. But half a mile from the castle the road climbed a hill and at its crest a great bowl opened up below them. They reined in. The medieval castle was built out on an island in a lake, or possibly within a moat so broad it seemed like a lake. It was a magnificent towered and turreted fortress in white limestone, as gorgeous a military confection as any of the castles of the Loire valley. But between them and the castle the long frontage of a modern château had been raised, a palace King Rudolf had erected for his sister, who held the Zenda estate for life. It was a large but not a pompous structure, as too many of the princely residences of the Empire were in James’s view. It was just a long range of fifteen bays in three storeys, stuccoed and painted yellow, set up on a terrace. But its proportions were pleasing and in its woodland setting it looked very welcoming and oddly homely for a royal palace.
Sentry boxes and a bar straddled the road as it reached the Great Park, and James should not have been surprised to find blue-coated guardsmen on duty there, as Zenda was after all a royal residence. A lieutenant scrutinised his papers and deferentially bowed him through, saying an under-chamberlain would be awaiting him at the main entrance.
In fact Prince Henry himself was pacing the south terrace and loudly hailed his brother. He warmly shook Frank Potts’s hand.
‘You’ll be glad to know your former comrade Freddie Winslow came down from Strelsau with me, Mr Potts. He’s sketching the castle from the rear terrace.’
Taking the hint, Frank bowed to the prince and headed into and through the house.
‘So now Jimmy, welcome to Zenda, which is the heart of our family’s lands in Rothenia. This was the castle awarded to the first Rudolf Elphberg when he married Osra, the heir of Duke Waclaw III of the Rothenians, over two hundred and fifty years ago. But it’s another great lady by the name of Osra who’s awaiting you today.’
The prince led James into the house through a tall central door flanked by guards, who snapped to attention and presented arms with Prussian rigidity as he passed.
‘Our father might have done better in selecting the design for this house, in my opinion. The long front lacks a certain drama. Also this hall is somewhat bare and austere.’
James laughed. ‘Nothing that a few artfully placed statues and canvases can’t fix.’
‘Maybe so, Jimmy. But the royal collection is employed in prettifying the Strelsau palaces, not out in the wilds here.’
‘You’ve become full of ideas about décor since you acquired your own house, Heinz. Frank came back from the Palais du Bâtard full of praise for your modest eyrie on the heights of the Old City, though he did say he found it ... cluttered.’
‘Cluttered!’ exclaimed the prince in mock outrage, as he paused at a ground floor doorway.
James persisted. ‘The new theory, my dear, is to aim for a classical simplicity in the great house. So our father was ahead of fashion here in Zenda.’
Henry opened the door and motioned James through into the room. ‘Perhaps you can compliment the man in person then.’
Startled, James stopped dead in the doorway. In a window alcove a tall, plainly dressed man in dark violet, his sandy-grey hair tied back, turned towards him. The expression on his face was an odd mixture of the satirical and quizzical, rather like that of Voltaire in the woodcuts James had seen. It was his father, King Rudolf III of Ruritania.
***
Freddie and Frank embraced with warmth and then leaned together on the wall of the terrace, surveying the remarkable view across the lake, where walls and towers rose dramatically out of the dark waters. There was a slight breeze, so the lake rippled with small waves. A line of mallards scudded past below them, quacking noisily. A long bridge to their right reached to the great gatehouse by several arches, closed at the end by a barbican and a drawbridge. The Elphberg banner flew from the highest turret of the castle.
‘I should have made more of this place in my travel book,’ Freddie commented. ‘I didn’t do it justice. But then I only knew it by report.’
‘So you’re in print, Freddie! Congratulations. I’m pretty sure you’ll have a copy with you, so I can admire it later.’
‘I take one everywhere so I can pencil in corrections and additions, you know, just in case there’s ever a second edition.’
Frank chuckled. ‘So not through vanity then.’
‘How about you Frank? You’ve been with the embassy over two years now. You seem settled there.’
‘And so I am. I’m as pleased as Punch to carry on at Munich with Herr Mossinger’s happy crew for as long as Lord Burlesdon needs us. It gets more and more interesting, believe me.’
‘Oh, I do. I occasionally miss you fellows. How’s old Dunbar? I thought he’d be off back to England by now.’
‘I’d have thought that too,’ said Frank. ‘I don’t pretend to understand Protestant clergy, but I thought for most of them it was all about gaining livings and tithes, which he can’t do in Germany. But he’s happy with his little congregation in Munich. He’s keeping that big brain of his ticking over, corresponding with a dozen Lutheran and Reformed theologians and writing tracts and sermons. He’s taken against Deism ... whatever that is. He was thick as thieves with Sebastienne Wollherz’s friend, Professor Weishaupt, the other day. Everyone says the professor’s a Freemason.’
‘Bessie has a friend who’s a professor and a Freemason? Tell me more.’
‘There’s not much to tell. He was speaking at her ladyship’s last salon. An odd fellow, but charismatic. He had the gathering spellbound. While he was speaking he seemed to make more sense than most of my lecturers at Heidelberg ever did. He wasn’t a Doctor Dryasdust; far from it.’
Freddie frowned. ‘I can’t see how such a man and Bessie Wollherz could have much in common. Her interests aren’t scholarly, quite the opposite. For her, it’s all about doing, not thinking.’
Frank gave his friend a narrow look. ‘Seems to me that you and the lady have had a falling out. Is that so?’
Freddie gave a sigh. ‘Let’s take a stroll across that bridge. I want to tell you some things, and you mustn’t think I’m mad when I do.’
***
After an opening exchange of civilities, the king motioned James to a seat. Though they were father and son meeting for the first time in their lives, rigid royal protocol still ruled the room. James could not take a seat till his father had, nor could he open the conversation. So he sat for long moments under the king’s quizzical gaze.
Eventually King Rudolf began to speak. ‘I wanted to see you today before you met your aunt, James. Delighted though I am to meet you at last, nonetheless where I’m concerned, business will always trump pleasure, as I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear.’
James gave a small smile. ‘Not at all, father,’ he said.
The king relaxed back into his armchair, and surveyed James. ‘You do take after me you know. Your mother assured me as much in our correspondence, and also provided this evidence.’ He delved in his coat pocket, and fished out an oval portrait case. He opened the cover and showed that within it was a miniature of James Rassendyll, aged ten. James remembered the likeness being taken at Burlesdon Hall by a celebrated society portraitist. He had half wondered what happened to it, since it had not been amongst his mother’s personal effects. It seems it had travelled out of the kingdom and been intended for his other parent.
‘You’re not unlike Henry at the same age,’ the king continued’ ‘but even more like myself as a boy. No one in Ruritania could mistake your paternity, I think. You do well to hide that Elphberg hair with a wig, my dear James. Now, to that business I mentioned.
‘You’ll have noticed my ambassador in Munich has been recalled and a new envoy sent from Strelsau. He’s General the Ritter von Geldstadt, a rather more astute fellow than his predecessor, who’ll be happier with his undemanding new post in the Hague. General von Geldstadt on the other hand has skills which fit him for these troubling times when we seem to lurch from one crisis to another, like a runaway carriage on a mountain road.
‘No sooner has the civil war in Glottenburg been resolved than the Bavarian problem reasserts itself. You will recall how you helped put together a princely alliance to frustrate Prussian meddling in the Bavarian succession and restore some influence in German affairs to the Imperial Diet. But the succession problem is becoming more acute, and your government’s interest in southern Germany has slackened. We’re back where we were two years ago, and London’s priorities have changed. You will have no doubt been following Lord North’s problems in the American colonies, and it seems your overstretched military has been complaining that it would be quite unable to answer any demand to quell civil unrest across the Atlantic Ocean.’
James was startled. ‘Sir! How do you know such matters?’
His father’s satirical smile emerged again. ‘My dear boy, I read my ambassadors’ despatches as closely as does your King George, though I believe I understand them better. My envoy in London is quite as accomplished an agent as you are for your king, and he knows what to look for and where. So he and my agents in Cassel, Stuttgart and Ernsthof are telling me that a certain General Cameron has been recently touring the war ministries of the princes of the Empire, enquiring into the possibility of contracting for the services of some of their regiments in North America.’
James was taken aback. He remembered General Cameron from his mission of 1772, sent by Whitehall to join his tour of the princely courts. It seemed he had been kept in the dark by Lord Rochford as to the real reasons for the general’s presence on his tour.
His father carried on. ‘I’m not asking for any information on the matter from you, James. But you’ll realise that rumour of such approaches very soon gets around, and your aunt tells me she believes that Duke John Casimir had also been approached on the subject during his rule of Glottenburg. What this signifies to me is that I can no longer expect much help in the Bavarian problem from your master, the king of Great Britain and elector of Hanover. And it is becoming acute, as I’m sure you will have picked up.’
‘You see war brewing, sir?’
The king raised an eyebrow. ‘I hope not, but it is always a possibility when Frederick of Prussia is involved. He reminds me of what I’ve read of Julius Caesar, a politician who believed that any problem could be solved by war and just as confident he had the ability to deliver success in battle. Unfortunately in Frederick’s case history has not provided us with any Brutus and Cassius as a corrective. So let me tell you the full measure of my fears, and what it is you must look out for, if not what you should do. You are after all the servant of a different king than your father.’
***
Freddie watched Frank’s expression circulate between incredulity and concern. He gave an internal sigh as he wound up his tale of guardians, winged horses, elves and magical conspiracy. He knew it would go this way, and all he had left was one card to play, which he was dubious about. As he looked into Frank’s stunned eyes he paused yet again to worry if indeed this was not after all a descent into madness and delusion on his part. It was the reason he hadn’t dared talk about it with Bastian, but this talk on the windy battlements of Zenda with Frank Potts was a necessary attempt to come to grips with what he had discovered. He at least believed he had not set out his case like a madman and had kept up a reasoned and calm narrative. A lot now rested on whether or not he could persuade this man of the reality of what he had experienced.
‘So there,’ he said, ‘believe me or not, I’m caught up in some supernatural tussle between the powers that rule this world and the one beyond. On the one side there’s Princess Osra Madeleine who’s using all her skills and powers to engineer a union between the two Rothenian nations, with her little grandson as her chief weapon. But then there’s Bessie Wollherz, who may be working for the princess, but she has her own plans. Hers aren’t subtle either. She’s at the head of my list of suspects for the murder of John Casimir. Princess Osra had neatly sidelined him, but it wasn’t enough for Bessie. She wanted him off the board, and arranged it herself, never mind that the man was the son of her patron. I shudder to think who’ll be her next target. And then there’s the other side.’
Frank shook his head. ‘The Elf of Strelsau? Freddie … really …’.
‘Yes I know how it sounds. And it sounds just as demented to me when I speak it out loud. This supernatural child is from outside the circles of the world. I know, because he took me there. He was quite open that the present mess is his own fault. In some arcane struggle to protect the boundaries between the worlds, he got rather too interested in this one. The end result was that he recruited a band of human youths who became his friends, and one of them, the man we know as the Count of St-Germain, was for many years his chief agent in the mortal realm. The count really did have the magical powers people thought he did and he really did live longer than he ought to have. But when he finally departed this life he was able to leave behind him his powers as a legacy to his favourite descendant, Bessie Wollherz. But did he know the true measure of the woman and what she might do with them? I doubt it.’
‘Look Freddie,’ Frank rallied. ‘I’ve heard of this condition where people lose all track of what’s real and what isn’t, it’s all down to the humours of the body, and it can seem very convincing …’.
Freddie held up his hand. ‘I knew it would come to this. I’m sorry Frank for what I have to do to you.’ He paused and then exclaimed aloud ‘JONAS NIEMAND! JONAS NIEMAND! JONAS NIEMAND!’
***
James was ushered by his father into an adjoining reception room after their interview. The king arched an eyebrow. ‘You surely did not think that you would escape a family party today? I think you’ve met all my other children, apart from Ferdinand. Perhaps that’s as well. Not that he is in any way hostile to you or the idea of you as a half-brother. It’s just that in company he can be … tedious. I really don’t know how it is Heinz and he get on so well. Perhaps Heinz regards him scientifically, like one of his specimens in bottles.’
As James was digesting the significance of that remark, and reflecting that his father’s reputation for satirical observations was well-justified, the room next door rose at the king’s entry. As well as James’s aunt and brother, there were three children present. All were in various degrees of mourning dress. James was able to identify the smallest of them as Duke Willem Stanislas of Glottenburg, hanging about his grandmother’s skirts, both of them in dark and unrelieved black. The other two had yet to be introduced, so he met for the first time his nephew Ernst Albert, the hereditary prince of Thuringia, a plain-looking boy of around fourteen, and his niece, the Princess Amelia, a pretty girl of ten years who looked rather like her mother and James’s sister the Duchess Clementina, who was not present.
All sat as the king took a seat, and a bustle of footmen introduced drinks and large trays of food, far more than the small party required. James took a sofa seat next to Princess Osra, and was solemnly introduced to the child duke of Glottenburg as his highness’s cousin.
‘James is my nephew, Staszek,’ the princess informed him. ‘He’s from a land far away called England where he is a count and an excellency.’
The child nodded. ‘I’m a duke!’ he declared. ‘Dukes are more important than counts, but kings like Uncle Rudolf are more important than dukes. Granny, maybe I could be king of Glottenburg? I’d have a crown! Wouldn’t that be splendid.’
His grandmother laughed. ‘But you’re a special sort of duke, and you already have a rather fine crown, which you can wear when you’ve grown a bit!’
Little Willem Stanislas was intrigued to hear this, and was about to scamper over with the news to his cousin, Amelia of Thuringia, when two things happened.
The boy stopped dead in the middle of the carpet and his head whipped round as if he’d heard a loud bang, though there was no sound of anything of the sort. ‘Oh!’ he cried. ‘He’s here!’
James looked over to Princess Osra, but she had gone pale and rigid, her hand shooting to her breast and clutching the silver brooch pinned there. She had undeniably been startled by something, but what?
***
Meanwhile, across the lake and high on the castle battlements, Freddie and Frank were no longer alone. Frank stared at the naked elven child perched in the embrasure, nonchalantly kicking his legs as he stared appreciatively around. Smiling at Frank Potts, he said a civil hello. ‘I do like castles,’ he added. ‘I suppose it’s because I’m a boy. They were quite fun in the old days, you know.’
‘You speak English?’ Frank stammered. ‘You’re real!’
‘Oh yes … quite real, Mr Potts. So maybe now you can believe all that my friend Freddie’s told you. Adults are such a pain, you know. Kids are so much quicker to understand me and what I am. Freddie at least knew that there’s magic, as that Antonin girl had spared me the trouble of proving it to him. But we have to go through it all with you again.’
‘Er … sorry to be such a trouble, Master Elf,’ Frank stuttered.
The child laughed. ‘Ha! That’s quick! You’re already getting used to the idea. Maybe I wasn’t fair to you, Mr Potts. Look, I haven’t got long. I can’t enter the world these days without being … noticed. Especially if I’m too close to the Osra lady, and she’s down there in the big house. I can even see from here the room she’s in. My appearance makes ripples in reality, like a stone in a pond. And I just made a big splash right next to her.’
The elven boy laughed. ‘Still, that’ll shake her up a bit. Maybe she needs shaking up. Power like she has wasn’t given her to be taken out into the world. She’s a servant of a greater power, not its master, and she’s forgotten it, if she ever knew. Royal people always like to think they’re in charge.’
Freddie’s ears pricked up. ‘So you don’t think she was a good choice for a Guardian, Master Jonas?’
The child shrugged. ‘She’s not really my business, but that Antonin girl of hers is. You have no idea of the trouble she’s turning out to be! Anyway, that’s the thing I want you to help me with, Mr Potts. She’s up to something wicked in that city of Munich where you live. Now I could go in and sort her out for good and all. It’s what I’m supposed to do. But turning the girl into a pile of dust is not the right way to deal with things in this case. And if I get too close to her she will know I’m there. I can’t hide myself from her. So it’s down to you, Mr Potts.’
‘What, me? What can I do against the likes of her?’
‘That’s the thing isn’t it. Quite a lot, I think. I’ve tried giving powers to you humans to see what happens when you become truly magical. It was a thing supposed to help me out in my tasks in this world too, but it hasn’t been a total success. There just aren’t many humans like Karl Wollherz; people who think as deeply as he did and are as modest, loving and kind as he was. In fact he may have been unique in your history so far. Even as great a person as the Lady Fenice couldn’t entirely be relied on. But then, she was a great lady and a countess, while Karl was a humble boy who lived on the streets, though in some ways he was more noble than Fenice was. So Mr Potts and you, Freddie, are on your own. Find out for me what the girl is up to. I shall come looking for you when I need to.’
With that, the elven child was suddenly no longer there. Freddie stared at a bewildered Frank, who wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. ‘I need a drink … badly,’ he said.
***
Little Duke Staszek caused something of a scene at the family reception. He demanded to go and find his ‘friend Jonas’ and became very fretful when he was restrained.
‘It’s his imaginary friend,’ a somewhat flustered Princess Osra told James. ‘And he’s a little over-tired.’ Eventually, the prince’s nursemaid appeared and took the grizzling boy away, while the pensive princess resumed her seat, though she was somewhat withdrawn for a while. She only perked up when King Rudolf pronounced that it was time for him to begin his return to the capital, and that he was spending the night at the palace of the Marshal Prince of Tarlenheim at Fürstenburg ten miles away. All stood as the king got to his feet. He called James over.
‘James my dear,’ he said, taking his son’s hand, ‘meeting you has been a pleasure delayed far too long. It won’t be the last such occasion, I am quite sure. I realise that your position as ambassador of a foreign power puts some restriction on our meeting. But you have enough excuses to visit your brother and aunt in Strelsau, and should you do so it’s a short walk to the Residenz. And of course you will not be a diplomat for ever. And now I shall do a thing we call in Ruritania a pozechnen, a father’s blessing to his son.’
So James stood as the king said some Rothenian words over him, took his cheeks in his hands, and kissed his forehead. James felt moved enough to kneel and kiss the king’s hand in response. Henry followed him and likewise kissed King Rudolf’s hand.
After the king’s departure James too took leave of the gathering, for he had to get back to Saptenburg and his wife. A footman was sent to seek out Frank Potts, who joined his employer as he was climbing into the saddle of his mount in the stable yard. Along with Frank came Freddie Winslow, whom James greeted with some pleasure, and they exchanged their news while Frank’s own horse was brought out.
‘Well dear Freddie,’ James said, ‘I’ve ordered your book for the Munich embassy and for the libraries at Burlesdon Hall and Park Lane. I believe it’s causing a sensation in a small way in our Eastern Division of Norfolk, and your mother is doing a sterling job marketing it to the local gentry. I rather think your parents are very proud. It’s the evidence they’ve been hoping for that you’re making something of yourself in the world.’
‘Thank you, my lord,’ Freddie smiled. ‘The second one is on its way. May I dedicate it to you on publication?’
‘By all means, Freddie. I’d be delighted if you would. I hope you’ll be able to find your way back to Munich soon. Your friends miss you sadly, though they’d be reluctant to confess it, eh Frank? … Frank?’
Frank Potts shook himself out of his evident abstraction with a visible shudder. ‘Sorry, my lord. Of course. We … I … miss Freddie. The other fellows pick on me now instead.’ He addressed Freddie directly. ‘Keep in touch, young Winslow. I’ll be writing soon about … y’know.’
The two mounted men touched crops to their hat brims, and trotted out under the pedimented arch of the yard into the Great Park of Zenda, spurring their horses along the road back to Saptenburg. Freddie watched them go a little sadly. His Munich days were in his past, but he missed the friends he had made there. Just briefly as he unburdened himself and his problems to Frank Potts, he had lost that feeling of loneliness that had grown on him as the supernatural struggle over the future of the Rothenian lands sucked him in. He sighed, put his hands deep in his pockets and wandered moodily back into the palace of Zenda.