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Updated: May 22, 2025
They told him that they had positive information that the Serbians already had crossed the frontier into Lutha, and that the presence of the Austrian troops was purely for the protection of Lutha. It was not until the morning following the rebuff of Prince von der Tann that Peter of Blentz, Count Zellerndorf and Maenck heard of the occurrence.
"You could as well be married there as elsewhere." "Because I don't trust your majesty," replied the American. "It must be done precisely as I say or not at all. Are you agreeable?" The king assented with a grumpy nod. "Then get up and write as I dictate," said Barney. Leopold of Lutha did as he was bid. The result was two short, crisply worded documents.
Barney paused, half-way into the royal union suit, and leveled the revolver at Leopold. The king picked up one of the garments gingerly between the tips of his thumb and finger. "Hurry!" admonished the American, drawing the silk half-hose of the ruler of Lutha over his foot. "If you don't hurry," he added, "someone may interrupt us, and you know what the result would be to you."
There had been murmurings then when the lad's uncle, Peter of Blentz, had announced to the people of Lutha the sudden mental affliction which had fallen upon his nephew, and more murmurings for a time after the announcement that Peter of Blentz had been appointed Regent during the lifetime of the young King Leopold, "or until God, in His infinite mercy, shall see fit to restore to us in full mental vigor our beloved monarch."
The Austrian uniform, however, would convict him, or at least lay him under suspicion, and in Barney's present case, suspicion was as good as conviction were he to fall into the hands of the Austrians. The garb had served its purpose well in aiding in his escape from Austria, but now it was more of a menace than an asset. For a week Barney Custer wandered through the woods and mountains of Lutha.
After the custom of Lutha, the bride had walked alone up the broad center aisle to the foot of the chancel. Guardsmen lining the way on either hand stood rigidly at salute until she stopped at the end of the soft, rose-strewn carpet and turned to await the coming of the king. Presently the doors at the opposite end of the cathedral opened.
So saying he left the room and a moment later Peter of Blentz smiled as he heard the pounding of a horse's hoofs upon the pavement without. Then the Regent entered the room he had recently quitted and spoke to the nobles of Lutha who were gathered there. "Coblich has found the body of the murdered king," he said. "I have directed him to bring it to the cathedral.
"Butzow," he said suddenly to the lieutenant of horse, "how many do you imagine know positively that he who has ruled Lutha for the past two days and he who was crowned in the cathedral this noon are not one and the same?" "Only a few besides those who are in this room, your majesty," replied Butzow.
Some day the Princess Emma, his daughter, will be my queen." Count Zellerndorf was the first to grasp the possibilities that lay in the suggestion the king's words carried. "Your majesty," he cried, "there is a way to unite all factions in Lutha. It would be better to insure the loyalty of Von der Tann through bonds of kinship than to antagonize him. Marry the Princess Emma at once.
"I regret having to report to your majesty," replied the officer, "that both must have escaped. A thorough search of the entire castle has failed to reveal them." Barney scowled. He had hoped to place these two conspirators once and for all where they would never again threaten the peace of the throne of Lutha in hell. For a moment he lay in thought. Then he addressed the officer again.
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