Oliver VII (18 page)

He handed over the envelope. The King opened it. The letter read:

King Oliver entered his capital amid general rejoicing. The streets were a-flutter with flags; the Westros department store was adorned with huge portraits of Oliver and Princess Ortrud, seemingly made from entire rolls of silk and
broadcloth
; mothers held their children up to catch a glimpse of the happily waving King, and loyal inscriptions such as ‘King Oliver—King of our Hearts’, and ‘We cannot live without Oliver. Long live the Great Triumphal Return!’ were daubed on walls.

King Oliver appeared on the balcony of the royal palace, and greeted his people with a few warm, informal words. The welcome ovation went on forever. Then, when he left the balcony and returned to the room, his government ministers swarmed around to congratulate him.

“Life has taught me a great deal,” he told his closest
followers
. “You can’t escape the fact that a man sees things very differently once he has viewed them from below. Clodia, my dear, you should get to know what life is really like.”

“No good would come of that!” she replied, deeply
offended
. “Life is for servants. Let them do it for me.”

“Cheep cheep,” Count Antas warbled at Diogenes. The King’s favourite canary’s cage stood beside his writing desk. “Your Highness should have seen how the poor thing pined night and day for his master!”

“But I brought him his hemp seed every day,” cooed the fire-eating Delorme.

Gradually the ministers withdrew from the room, revealing Gervaisis deep asleep in an armchair. The newly appointed Colonel Mawiras-Tendal went over and shook him. He woke, and declared:

“Who once puts his hand to the plough should never look back!”

“Quite right,” said the Colonel, and led him away.

By now the only people left in the room were the King and Count St Germain, whom the King had asked to stay behind. He offered him a chair and took a seat himself.

“My dear Count,” he began, “I kept you here because I want to thank you at this time of happy celebration … ”

“No thanks are necessary, Your Highness, none at all.”

“I have a great deal to thank you for. I have honoured you with the Grand Cross of the Order of St Florian and
appointed
you as my financial adviser, but this is truly a small reward for the services you have done me. It was from you that I learnt how to come to terms with the fact that I am a king.”

“Well, Your Highness, there are more painful and difficult professions to master.”

“There’s only one thing I don’t understand. You know
everything in advance, you plan with enormous care, and what you don’t know you seem to sense intuitively … so is it possible that I, a talentless beginner, could really have fooled you, the master, for so long?”

“We all have our moments of mental blindness. But in fact Your Highness shouldn’t be so modest: you played the part of simple Oscar brilliantly. The first time I ever saw Your Highness … perhaps the voice of my illustrious ancestor whispered to me through the mist of centuries: ‘Oubalde Hippolyte Théramene, this gentleman has royal blood!’ And I was right to trust him, because he really was an expert on royalty. But then, the message came down through the mist of ages, and perhaps I misunderstood it. Or again, when the illustrious Coltor first recognised Your Highness, it might have occurred to me that a man like that doesn’t often get things wrong … and your reaction could well have given you away to me … though at moments like that the gods can inflict blindness on the ablest mortal minds. And of course, during the negotiation, even the simplest person, if not
actually
drunk, must have seen at once that Your Highness was a king, and bore yourself like one … But perhaps it is more romantic if we content ourselves with the thought that on this one occasion St Germain was taken in. For the first time in my life, and I’m confident it’ll be the last. There must surely have been a divine purpose at work here.”

“Now I am completely confused. Did I fool you, or did you see through everything?”

“I beg you, Your Highness, not to pursue this. Permit me instead to conduct a little official business.”

He stood up and, with the sort of flourish a magician might employ, conjured some jewellery from one of his pockets.

“Your Highness, this necklace was created for you by that jeweller in Venice. It is a gift—something we planned in
the Palazzo Pietrasanta of blessed memory. It all went very smoothly, and Mr Coltor has already settled the bill for it. But I must also mention that he gave us a hundred thousand
dollars
on behalf of the Concern, which we asked for at the time as an advance. He has now made it my reward for services in connection with the treaty.”

“Well, well, well. So now we don’t have to nip off to Mexico.”

“I think this is the most appropriate moment to hand the necklace over to you, as Princess Ortrud will be arriving in Lara within the week.”

The King took the necklace and studied it thoughtfully.

“Very beautiful,” he said. “Very beautiful, wonderfully executed. But … ” (he drew it closer to him, deep in thought) “ … properly speaking, it belongs to Marcelle. That ring of hers that we commandeered to hire the Palazzo Pietrasanta, and so laid the foundations of Alturia’s prosperity, will not glitter in the pages of history. All the rich people have had a reward. She’s the only one who hasn’t. How could we
possibly
forget her? Please, send this little gift to Mlle Marcelle Desbois. I’m sure you’ll know where to find her.”

“An excellent suggestion, I am sure. But there isn’t very far to go. Marcelle is here in the palace.”

“What? Here, in the palace?” the King shouted. “And you tell me only now?”

“I thought Your Highness might wish to take your leave of her, and that it might be instructive for you to take one last look … at life, as it is lived down there. If you would be so gracious as to allow me, I shall call her straight away.”

A moment later he was back, leading Marcelle by the hand.

“Mademoiselle Marcelle Desbois!” he announced
ceremonially
.

Marcelle was dressed simply, but very elegantly, for a
journey
. Her face wore hardly any make-up. She looked at the King with a serious, formal expression, and curtsied.

The King’s face lit up, and was again the face of simple Oscar. It was as if the marshal’s greatcoat was quite forgotten.

“Marcelle!” he shouted, and moved quickly towards her.

But when he saw that she hadn’t moved, and continued to present him with that solemnly austere face, he was shocked. He stopped and looked around for St Germain. But St Germain had discreetly vanished through the same side door through which he had brought the girl.

“Marcelle … ” he began, rather hesitantly. “But it’s truly wonderful that you are here.”

She smiled a small, restrained smile, but said nothing.

“So tell me … how do you like my country?”

“Very pretty,” she replied.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s very pretty. Or shouldn’t I have said that?”

The King swallowed briefly.

“Oh, but it is. Wonderfully so.”

This was not what he had expected. He had hoped for something of the old Marcelle, some down-to-earth language of the sort he was so familiar with.

“And yet … ” he began … “don’t you find, this palace … a bit shabby … a twaddlesome sort of place … in comparison to the Louvre, perhaps. Tell me it’s all twaddle,” he almost pleaded.

“I find it aesthetically very pleasing, and at the same time very cosy, Your Highness.”

He took a step closer to her.

“Tell me, Marcelle … or don’t you remember me … your Oscar?” His voice was little more than a whisper. “You don’t remember Oscar, and how no one could have been more
useless
than he was, how you had to scold him all the time?”

“Of course I remember, Your Highness,” she said, coldly, almost resentfully.

Her aloofness reduced him to even greater despair.

“Then why won’t you talk to me as Oscar? I shall always be Oscar to you. Or are you still angry with the old Oscar, and regret the whole thing? Speak to me, the way you used to.”

“Of course I’m not angry,” she replied, in a strained,
hesitant
voice. “Of course I’m not angry with you. Oscar will always be my dear old pal.”

She raised her arms towards him, but the gesture was
somehow
arrested half-way, and she shrunk back into herself.

“No, please don’t ask me for the impossible. Your Highness is King Oliver VII of Alturia, not Oscar. Oh, Oscar was someone else entirely.”

“Why? What was Oscar like?”

“Oscar was the kind of boy who could con twenty-four locomotives out of an American railroad king … ”

“I can tell you now, that story wasn’t true.”

“I know, Your Highness. But Oscar was the sort of boy who said that kind of thing, just to win my heart. He was a dear, dear boy.”

“Please sit, Marcelle,” he said, defeated. Memories flooded back, overwhelming him. His one venture into the real world … “Tell me something about Oscar.”

“I remember,” she said thoughtfully, her eyes fixed
somewhere
above his head, “we went together once on a boat trip to Torcello. We didn’t have much money so we packed some bread and ham into a bag—good fresh Italian ham and Bel Paese cheese—and we were just like the concierges in Paris going off on a Sunday to shoot at St Cloud. And on the boat they thought we were on our honeymoon. We went to the front of the boat and a wave hit us and we were completely drenched, and Oscar was afraid I’d catch a cold because the
wind was up. At Torcello we settled ourselves down on the grass and unpacked our lunch, and in the bar they brought us glass after glass of wine. After dinner Oscar read
La Stampa
and fell asleep, and I tied a garland of daisies to his hat. And we were just like people on honeymoon, and those Paris
concierges
. That evening Oscar played his mouth organ in the lovely moonlight, and we sang. That’s when Your Highness was Oscar … truly Oscar … But now … ”

The King rose and paced up and down the room, deep in thought. He remembered that trip to Torcello very well. Then … he had indeed been truly Oscar then … he had been just like anyone else: like a human being …

Suddenly he came to a halt and looked at her.

“You are quite right,” he said sternly, as if to himself. “That Oscar is no more. He’s dead. He no longer exists. So, Oliver VII, King of Alturia, what have you to say to Mlle Marcelle Dubois, from Paris, who asks, and expects, nothing from you?

“Look, Marcelle,” he continued, after a further pause. “You must at least allow me to carry out poor Oscar’s last wishes.”

He took the necklace from the table and held it out to her.

“Oscar sends you this gift. You remember, the poor fellow always promised that if any of his ventures ever succeeded, you would be the first person he thought of. This is poor Oscar’s one gift to you.”

She took the box in her hand, opened it, took the necklace out and began to fiddle with it nervously.

“Thank you very much,” she said softly. “I really do thank you. It’s wonderful. Miraculous. I always said that Oscar was a really good boy.”

Then, with eyes full of sorrow, she added. “And I would have said the same if he hadn’t sent this present to me.”

She smiled, very slightly. The King came a step closer. For a moment he felt that, despite everything, something of the old passion between Oscar and Marcelle was still alive. But, with the most delicate of gestures, she stopped him in his tracks.

“Look, Your Highness, I know I have to be sensible about this. You were never really right as Oscar, and I’d probably be the same if I mixed with royalty.”

For a long while the King stood there, silent and very sad. Then:

“So, Marcelle, and what will you do next, if I may be so bold as to ask?”

She lowered her gaze.

“A good friend of mine has bought himself a car and invited me to go with him to Brittany.”

“That’s excellent. They say Brittany is at its best at this time of year. I envy you, Marcelle. Tell me, would it be very impertinent if I asked who that person is?”

“No, of course not. Your Highness knows him well: Sandoval, the painter.”

For a moment he was gripped by fierce jealousy. Oh, the lucky rascal! He always chooses the pick of everything for himself! When it comes to a profession, he paints; in politics, he’s a conspirator; and now he’s going off to Brittany with Marcelle, on the money I gave him as a reward for his
services
! But then he remembered the whole moral lesson he had brought back from his brief excursion into real life, and said, with resignation:

“Then go, Marcelle. I would have gone too, but from now on my place is forever in Lara. Have a good time, Marcelle. Goodbye.”

Once again she made a deep curtsey, then went out through the door by which she had entered. A moment later St Germain was back in the room.

“St Germain,” the King mused, “yet again you have taught me something. If I hadn’t seen her now, perhaps for the rest of my life I would have mourned for the trip to Torcello and Oscar’s idyll … But why are you putting on that face?” he asked in sudden alarm.

“Your Highness, it’s a day of goodbyes and farewells. I wish to ask Your Highness’ permission to take leave of you myself.”

“You? Why? Where do you want to go?”

“To Buenos Aires, Your Highness. I’ve had a telegram from my friends there; they’re expecting me. I am needed to sort out a really big business deal.”

“Count, you’re joking!” the King shouted angrily. “Your place is to be forever at my side. As long as I am King here, you will always have good work to do.”