CHAPTER IV

He was eighteen years of age, of a superb constitution, perfect health, and noble descent, absolute monarch of a prosperous and well-governed country, troubled by neither plots among his nobility nor factions among his people.

He felt as if the world had been put into his hands, as a small globe to crush or fondle; his deep but hitherto sleeping pride, his vast and arrogant ambition were now finally roused by the humiliation into which his idle habits had led him, and the direct words of the woman who had attracted his cold fancy by her pretty, sad grace.

As a personality she was now dismissed from his thoughts, but he dwelt on her speech with a deep, mighty resolve forming in his powerful mind.

In every way he was equipped to play a great part in history; his father, a stern, just, and haughty prince, had educated him with great care and wisdom; his natural gifts for languages and mathematics had been developed by training and diligence; he was proficient in history and geography, well-versed in the lives of the heroes of ancient Greece and Rome whose example suited his temperament, and familiar with the sagas of Scandinavia, the only form of any art that had ever moved him; his understanding was beyond the common, and he had not as yet displayed any vice or weakness likely to obscure his fine qualities, beyond this indolent absorption in rude sports that he had shown since he came to the throne; he was neither cruel and given to abuse of power nor was he liable to the weakness of being led by flatterers. His notice of Viktoria Falkenberg was the first attention that he had ever accorded a woman.

He seemed to be without affection and without passion; to his father he had shown the only obedience he had ever displayed to a human being; his mother he had despised, for he had early observed how slight a value his father had set upon her gentleness and how harshly he had treated her; his feelings towards his sisters were the same, the old Queen he could only tolerate by ignoring. Count Piper, the one man to whom he had shown special favor, he liked but was not fond of, nor had he any warm feelings towards his country which he admired only inasmuch as it was his own.

He was conscious only of the desire to dominate, to be without a rival as he was without a master; and, now that the words of Viktoria Falkenberg had taken root in his mind, to be great, to master kings, and nations, and peoples, and stride over them to fresh conquests; the reinstatement of his brother-in-law, Sweden’s ancient ally, the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, in his dominions, was a good excuse for him to enter the arena of European politics where his fellow-monarchs considered him too young to play any part.

The true greatness of his strange character showed in his haughty resolve to conquer himself before ever he attempted to overcome his enemies.

He decided to be the one King without weakness or vices, and as easily as he took off his soiled garments of the chase he cast from him the vulgar amusements and rude diversions that had hitherto occupied his leisure.

The evening of the day that Viktoria Falkenberg had spoken to him he joined the Queen at her supper table.

His two sisters were present and the husband of the eldest, the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp.

Karl took his place at the head of the table; he was now absolutely sober and extremely cold in his demeanor; his disordered clothes of the morning had been changed for garments of black velvet and a muslin cravat fastened by a white pearl; his bright and waving hair was confined by a broad black ribbon save the foremost locks which fell over his shoulders; in this grave style of dressing, with his great height and noble person, he appeared much older than his years.

The Queen, who had, as usual, a bitter speech ready for him, snapped her lips together after she had glanced at his face; when he was master of himself she was afraid of him; he gave her a by no means friendly glance and his beautiful eyes traveled to the harassed countenance of his brother-in-law and the quiet faces of his sisters; the Queen, who was watching him shrewdly and with no predisposition in his favor, noticed that now more than ever before he dominated his company; the women, Count Piper, the young Duke all seemed pale and incomplete, like people cut out of paper, compared to his calm and overwhelming personality.

He did not sit down, but, pouring out a glass of wine, raised it almost to the level of his lips.

“Madame,” he said, addressing the Queen, “I must ask your pardon for my great discourtesy and boorishness to-day. I do ask it. I ask these gentlewomen to forgive me some insolences. I was not sober. That will never happen again.”

He paused for a second; there was no flush in his face, his eyes looked as hard as sapphires; he never glanced to where Viktoria Falkenberg sat beside the Duchess of Gottorp.

“I drink your health, Madame,” he continued, bowing towards the old Queen, “and I drink it in the last wine I shall ever taste.”

He emptied his glass and set it down quietly. “And now forgive me my absence,” he said. “I have much to attend to. Count, will you wait upon me later?”

Without pausing for a reply he left the room.

The Queen wiped her lips in a certain grim satisfaction.

“Well,” she remarked, “he is capable of keeping his word.”

Count Piper glanced at the downcast and weary face of Viktoria Falkenberg; she sat next to him and spoke, under the little murmur of talk that had arisen since the King’s departure.

“He will do, your master,” she said, “he is quite heartless, quite just, and inhumanly strong.”

“You spoke to him?”

She raised her eyes.

“Our interview was not what you think. We have really no interest in each other.”

Count Piper could not pretend to understand her; nor did he really care to explore the intricacies of feminine sentiment and feminine intrigue; if Viktoria Falkenberg was not going to influence King Karl she ceased to in the least concern Count Piper.

“His Majesty will help Gottorp, you think?” asked the Duchess.

“I think so,” said Count Piper.

He hastened his dinner that he might rejoin the King, who was already, he knew, in his cabinet.

And there he found him, standing by the window through which the long Northern twilight fell into the narrow apartment; his arms were locked over the back of a high chair and he leant forward, in the attitude of one dreaming.

Though he was so splendid in his magnificent youth there was something in his demeanor more terrifying than lovable, and his proud noble face was marred by the ugly smile that curved his full lips.

As soon as the Count entered he spoke, without raising his head.

“I shall go to war,” he said, and his voice that was always expressionless had a hard ring in its clear quality. “I shall return Gottorp to his duchy and I shall engage Denmark. Saxony must be brought from the throne of Poland, and from these I menace this Emperor of Muscovy--this Czar of the Russias.”

“I believe,” replied Count Piper, with perfect sincerity, “that your Majesty can do these things.”

“I believe that I can,” said Karl. “The most dangerous of my foes is Russia. He affects to be a mighty man, does he not?”

It was plain that this greatness of the Czar rankled with him; it was almost as if he had a personal hatred of this political enemy of his country whom he had never seen; this was the only person towards whom he had ever evinced the faintest anger or jealousy.

“The Czar is great,” replied the Count, “but your Majesty might be greater.”

“I would like to break him!” exclaimed the young man looking up. With that startling flash in the darkening blue of his eyes, he looked more human, more moved than Count Piper had ever known him. “’Tis a savage, a Tartar ... and he defies me ... wants my provinces ... _mine_, by God ... you have seen me drunk to-day, you will not see that again ... we will see if the Czar drunk can match me sober ... and Poland with his Aurora.... I will have no women, Count.”

He seemed greatly moved by a deep and restrained emotion.

“You owe something to one woman,” thought Count Piper, “if she has wrought this change of mind in you.”

And he wondered what Viktoria Falkenberg had said.

“Russia does not think that anyone is likely to oppose him,” continued Karl. “Is it not so? He believes that there is no man in Europe would face him and his savages.”

“He certainly thinks,” replied the minister, “that your Majesty will be easily despoiled. ’Tis a man with many noble qualities who seeks to bring his country forward in an honorable manner in Europe--yet unscrupulous and fierce--a barbarian teaching civilization to others--but,” he added, “before your Majesty thinks of Russia, there is Denmark.”

“I attend the council to-morrow,” said Karl, “and in a week’s time I hope to leave Sweden. The Dutch and English will help us--at least indirectly. I think it is not to King William’s interest that I should be overwhelmed. I mean to make a feint on Copenhagen and compel Denmark to a peace.”

“The Danish fleet protects Spaelland, sire,” said Count Piper quickly.

“But I have looked at the map,” replied the King, “and I see that one might pass through the Eastern Sound.”

“Which is not held to be navigable, sire.”

Karl did not seem to pay much attention to this remark.

“King Frederick is older than I, by ten years,” he said, reflectively. “Do you think that he is a great man, Count?”

“He is popular in Denmark, sire.”

“I am vexed,” added Karl, “that I let him take Gottorp--but,” he paused, then seemed to resolve to say no more on that subject. “England and the Netherlands will stand by us?” he asked.

“They certainly will not wish to see Denmark in possession of the commerce of the North, nor the Czar of Russia overspread his dominions. I believe we could count on the junction with the Anglo-Dutch fleet.”

“And Poland marches on Livonia,” said the King. “I hear his Saxon soldiers are very fine troops.”

“One thing has just come to my ears, sire--Patkul is with Poland.”

The King’s face hardened instantly at mention of this man who had led the Livonian revolts that had disturbed his father’s reign and whose intrigues had broken out again on his own accession; Patkul had been the only jarring note in the last years in Sweden; and rebellion was a hideous sin in the King’s rigid code of honor.

“When I make peace with Poland,” he said, “I shall bid him send back to me the traitor Patkul.”

Count Piper looked at him curiously; the certainty of his speech, the confidence of his bearing were amazing things, for they were entirely free from braggart vanity or youthful swagger.

The King saw his minister’s glance and slightly flushed.

“Perhaps,” he said quickly, “I seem vainglorious in my speech, but I was not thinking of myself, but of Sweden--Sweden could do great things, do you not think so, Count?”

It was like an attempt to conciliate, and the minister could not forbear a smile.

“Under such a King as you will be, sire,” he replied sincerely.

“Well,” said Karl, with his strange simplicity, “I do not see that it should be very difficult to defeat these three Kings.”

The next day he made his appearance at the council board in a mood different from any in which he had appeared there before.

The councilors had been used to seeing him with his feet on the table and his hands in his pockets, lolling and yawning; now he came erect and composed among them, and in a few words announced his intention of making war on Denmark, Poland, and Russia.

This swift facing of their enemies was not what the council had been expecting; they had already begun to consider the advisability of negotiations with the three sovereigns who were taking advantage of the youth of their King.

But Karl’s words left no doubt as to his intention and his spirit.

“Sirs,” he said, “I have resolved to never make an unjust war, but never to finish a just one save by the conquest of my enemies. My decision is taken--I shall attack him who first--who has declared himself against me, and when I have vanquished him I shall hope to inspire some fear in the others.”

That same evening he heard that the Saxon troops of the King of Poland, the regiments of Brandenbourg, Wolfenbüttel, and Hesse-Cassel were marching to the assistance of the King of Denmark, who after having taken Gottorp was besieging the town of Tönning in Holstein.

Against these were sent 8000 Swedes, some troops from Hanover and Zell, and three Dutch regiments, Holland, as well as England, having taken up arms against Denmark on the excuse of her having broken the Treaty of Altona.

In the early days of April, King Karl took private leave of his family (a cold farewell of his sisters and the Queen), and, accompanied by Count Piper, the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, and General Rehnsköld, left his capital for the port of Karlskrona, where he embarked on his flagship “The King Karl,” which was mounted with 120 pieces of cannon, and at the head of forty-three ships set sail for Copenhagen, on his first campaign.

As the shores of Sweden were receding behind them Count Piper told the King that he had heard that Viktoria Falkenberg was very ill; he had wondered that Karl had not remarked her absence from attendance on his sister.

“Ah, Viktoria Falkenberg,” said the King thoughtfully. He offered no comment, and that was the last time he ever spoke her name.