Виктория Холт - On the Night of the Seventh Moon

My hand was on the door handle. I tried to turn it but could not. The horrible thought struck me that I was locked in. But I was wrong. The reason the door would not open was because someone was holding it, trying to turn it and come in.

“Who is there?” I called.

The door opened and Ilse walked in.

“Ilse!” She hobbled towards me with the aid of a stick. I stared at her in astonishment, for I could not believe in the first seconds that it was really Ilse.

“Yes,” she said.

“It is. You are right, Helena.”

“What are you doing here? I have so much to say to you.”

“Yes, of course, Helena. You see I have grown infirm since we last met, I cannot walk very easily.”

She sat down in the chair I had vacated.

“I have so wanted to find you,” I cried.

She looked at the Duchess, who was staring into space in an extraordinary manner. She smiled at her fondly but the Duchess did not appear to see her.

“She is my sister,” said Ilse, ‘my half-sister. I was the result of one of those light love-affairs which are so prevalent in high places. I was brought up in the shadow of the palace, but never being part of it. I always loved my little sister, though. She is fifteen years younger than I. “

“I think she is ill.”

“She is heavily drugged. She has taken the draught that was meant for you. It should be you who would be sitting there, Helena. That was the plan. You were to be unconscious, in a stupor, and then we were going to take you out to the tower and let you fall over. Prinzstein was to have done it in the turret-room at Klocksburg. It would have been so much more appropriate there. But they bungled it. Her Grace was furious with them.”

“I don’t understand,” I said.

“Have you brought me here to murder me?”

“You have guessed aright, Helena. You were brought here to be disposed of. But I am not a murderess. They would say it was a weakness in me.”

“You are talking in riddles,” I said.

“Explain to me. She wants me dead because I am Maximilian’s wife-that’s true. I know. She brought me here to kill me.”

“You must not judge her harshly. She does not regard it as murder. It is a state of affairs that cannot be allowed to continue. She... the Duke’s mistress! It is impossible. His having a wife already cannot be tolerated. It is statecraft, she would say. Sometimes people have to die for it and in strange circumstances. She plans that when you are dead she and the Duke will be secretly married and few will be the wiser as to what has gone before. I have been brought up more rigidly. I see the deliberate killing of one person by another as murder. So I am here to look after you both. I looked after you once before you don’t realize what I did for you. I could so easily have disposed of you then. But I didn’`t. I looked after you, I made everything easy for you.

“Easy! That easy! Listen, Ilse, I want to know exactly what happened right from the beginning.”

“I’ll tell you. A husband was found for me. Ernst ambassador from Rochenstein. I married him and persuaded him to work for my country, Klarenbock. This sometimes meant working against Rochenstein. Ernst was a friend of Prince Maximilian before he came to Klarenbock and when he went back to Rochenstein with me as his wife, he had a post in the Prince’s entourage. He learned of Maximilian’s meeting with you and his obsession. Ernst had to go to London to see a heart specialist and he offered to bring you back.”

“So you posed as my cousin.”

The fact that your mother was a native of these parts made that easy.

We brought you back and arranged that you and Maximilian should meet on the Night of the Seventh Moon. There was the marriage. We believed it would be a mock marriage with a pseudo-priest, and when we discovered that Maximilian was so besotted that he had gone through a genuine ceremony we could see that this was disaster to the treaty which was being made between Rochenstein and Klarenbock. I was working for my native country and I realized that I had to act quickly. The Prince went away after the brief honeymoon because a rebellion was brewing and he had to be with his father. I should have left you in the lodge to be blown up, but I couldn’'t do it. My sister says that was the greatest mistake I ever made. From her point of view, I dare say it was, but I had come to look upon you as my little cousin. I was fond of you. I thought I would get you back to England and no one would be the wiser. So I destroyed the evidence of the marriage your lines and ring; and with the help of the doctor who was working with us we tried to convince you that you had lost six days of your life when you lost your virtue. I don’t know how we did it. “

“You never did,” I said.

“You never convinced me.”

“I feared not. And then you discovered you were going to have a child -a child who would be the legitimate heir to the dukedom! Ernst said I was a fool. I should first have kept you in the lodge when we blew it up, for after all it was blown up that we might convince Maximilian that you were dead. You should have been dead in truth, Ernst said.

But I couldn’'t do it. I preferred to take a chance in building up that fabric of lies, as you call it. But when the child was coming and all the terrible complications with it, even I began to waver. But I saved you, Helena. It would not have been difficult to get rid of you at that time. But I couldn’'t do it, and because we had people placed strategically over the country who could be used in any situation to work for Klarenbock I believed I could delude you and so save your life. “

“You were good to me. Ilse.”

“I don’t think you realize even now how good. My sister will never forgive me. I saved your life and then I allowed her to marry-or go through a form of marriage-knowing of your existence. I am not going to let her kill you now. Maximilian and you must proclaim the truth without delay, whatever the consequences. For the sake of you and the boy.

“The boy?”

“Your son.”

“My son. I have no son. My daughter, they told me, ‘died.”

“You know now that was untrue. You went to Dr. Kleine. He reported to me at once and I could see that things were reaching a climax. My sister discovered what had happened. Frederic knows. You and the boy are in acute danger. I have saved you today. Good luck has saved you both before. Neither can go on doing so. “

“My son, I repeated.

Fritz. “Fritz, my son! My child was a girl. She would not be as old as Fritz.”

“He is your child. We had to make it appear that he was older so that he was not connected with what happened at Dr. K-lei ne clinic. Oh, if you had stayed in England this would never have happened. My sister’s son would have inherited; the marriage in the lodge would have been of no importance. But because I am a sentimental woman who grew fond of you, because-spy that I am-I have never killed and cannot kill. I have ruined my sister’s life.

“

“What will happen now?” I asked.

“You will take the greatest care if you are wise. You will guard your life as you never guarded anything before. And you will watch over your son because he is in even greater danger.”

“There have been attempts on Fritz’s life.”

“They will not always fail. My sister was determined to remove you.

But there is a more powerful force which seeks to remove your son. “

I could only stare at her in speechless horror.

“Count Frederic!” she said.

“He has learned the truth. He has discovered the priest who performed the ceremony. He has spies everywhere even as we have. He has been suspicious for some time. He will now try to discredit Maximilian with the help perhaps of my father. I don’t know whether he will succeed in that. My father is an honourable man but the thought of what has happened to his daughter will incense him. But Frederic will think that it is useless to depose Maximilian while he has a son to follow him. Frederic wants the dukedom for himself. He has always wanted it as his father did; and it is very likely that in view of the scandal which this is inevitably going to bring about, the people of Rochenstein will reject Maximilian. But the Duke will then be Fritz because he is the direct heir. The boy is too young to rule and his father might well be appointed Regent. That would not suit Frederic. If Fritz did not stand in his way when Maximilian was deposed, the dukedom would almost certainly fall to Frederic. You must realize the importance of these politics, because you are involved in them your child is involved in them. For God’s sake watch over him. He is in imminent danger from the most ruthless man in Rochenstein. “