The Golden Portifor - 29. Chapter 29

A clatter on the stairs alerted Serge that the page Jonas was on his way. The child always ran full tilt up and down stairs, never seeming to need to pause. Indeed, when he tapped on the doorframe he was not so much as breathing heavily.

‘Lord Boro’s here, my lord!’ he announced.

Serge smiled to himself. ‘Not “Boro” Jonas, you call him Lord Boromeo or my lord von Tarlenheim. Understood?’

The boy grinned shyly. ‘Sorry, my lord.’

Serge stopped him before he dashed off again. ‘Are you settling in alright at Engelngasse, Jonas? Master Jan tells me you’re a very willing worker, quite as assiduous as was Andreas when he was doing your job.’

‘Thank you, my lord. I like it here. Karl and the others are my friends.’

Serge noticed yet again that the child had a remarkable vocabulary for a street boy. ‘Assiduous’ didn’t cause him a moment’s puzzlement, whereas if it had been Andreas at his age there would have had to be an explanation. There was clearly a story here which he must get back to.

‘Off you go, and thank you.’ And with another clatter, Jonas was haring off down the stairs again.

Serge’s brother arrived at a more sedate pace, and took a seat opposite him. He was surprised once more at how the boy was growing. Within weeks of his fifteenth birthday, he was now the same height as Serge. Recently he had lost his spots and it had much improved his looks, which were now fresh and open, while of a sudden his hair was golden and rich. Boromeo had not been a particularly handsome boy, but he was growing into a not unpleasing youth. Military life was giving him a direct and decisive way with people, allied with a growing social confidence which marked him out as a youth of high birth who expected his consequence to be observed. Colonel von Breitheim of the Leibgarde had remarked to Serge that Boromeo was developing into one of his best company officers, despite his lack of years. That morning he was in his captain’s uniform, which gave him the air of someone a couple of years older than he actually was. That would be useful for the day’s uncomfortable business.

‘We’ll ride down to the Radhaus Platz, I think,’ Serge said.

‘I had Gottlieb get Acheron ready as I came up,’ Boromeo replied. ‘Onyx seemed happy to be back in your yard, Serge. He was walking into the barn before I stopped him.’

The two brothers mounted up in the yard, and made their way down to the Neustadt and across the city to the old Tarlenheim house.

The urban mansion had been in the family’s hands since the building of the Neustadt. It was in fact older than the ducal Hofburg and was one of the first aristocratic hôtels erected in the city. It was on a large site which made up much of the north side of the square in front of the Radhaus, whose great tower loomed above the surrounding buildings. A Friday fish market was currently filling the square with servants shopping for the tables of the city’s convents and observant households, for today was a meatless day across Ruritania.

These days Mehmed was joining Serge, Andreas and Willi at the dinner table, as his days of fasting were over, and he had declared that he much appreciated fish dishes. It had to be said he made a rather good dinner companion, though the bottle needed to be kept away from him as much as possible. On Saturday the court of the crown prince would begin its leisurely and festive progress from Strelsau to Mittenheim. So today’s anticipated unpleasantness had to be got through promptly.

‘How long’s the house been empty?’ Boromeo asked. ‘It’s turning into a ruin.’

‘It was last open for the old man’s funeral, which you’ll remember even though you were only eight or nine at the time, but it’d been empty for years before that. His creditors got in one day and stripped the lead off the roofs before they were driven out by servants armed with muskets, so Herr Simon told me. Then the water got in and it became uninhabitable. It’ll need a lot of work.’

‘And money,’ the boy remarked, ‘and they’re not getting mine.’

‘Yes, well that’s to be seen.’

A wicket gate was open in the great doors onto the square, beside which stood a sober gentleman in black carrying a document case. He removed his hat and bowed to the two young noblemen.

‘Herr Cartier?’ Serge began. ‘This is my brother, Captain Boromeo von Tarlenheim-Olmusch. Boromeo, allow me to introduce Herr Tomas Cartier, notary and attorney in the Court of Chancery.’ He sighed. ‘Let’s get on with this.’

Serge called out as they entered the gloom of the house. Somewhere the sound of hammering was going on. Planks were stacked in an inner courtyard.

Their father appeared, tobacco pipe in one hand and stick in the other. He stood and sized his sons up, noting the lawyer beside them.

‘And who, sir, are you?’ he demanded of Herr Cartier.

The lawyer bowed respectfully. ‘I, your excellency, am an attorney representing your son in the case of Tarlenheim-Olmusch versus Tarlenheim, begun this morning before the king’s justices in Chancery. Here, sir, are writs absisteretis addressed to yourself and your brother the Graf.’

‘What the hell?’ He glared at his sons. ‘What have you two been up to?’

Serge got a grip on himself. ‘Father, I can’t see that you have any right to simply commandeer Boromeo’s hard-won fortune. So I’ve commenced a petition in Chancery to the king demanding natural justice and equity for him.’

‘You’ve done what!’

Herr Cartier seemed quite unintimidated. ‘Until the petition comes before the Lord Chancellor and his bench, your excellency may not in any way proceed to expropriate the funds of your son, which are now held in trust by the court. And in view of the severity of the gaze you are assuming, sir, I should warn you that the sternest penalties would apply to any action in defiance of this writ.’

The Graf Ruprecht was glaring at the three and had half-raised his stick. ‘You damnable fools. What right have you to defy your father and bring this rat of the court into my home. Out the pack of you, before I have the mastiffs on you! Get out of my sight. You’ll be hearing from me.’

Serge and Boromeo retreated out into the light and bustle of the Radhausplatz. The younger of the two looked very cheerful indeed as they stood on the cobbles and bade farewell to the lawyer. Boromeo was all but laughing as he said, ‘Well, that was the most enjoyable thing I’ve done in a long time. I see him now for the raddled old bully he is. I won’t be afraid of him ever again. Thank you brother. And thank you Herr Cartier. I must be off to the Leibgarde barracks, I have troopers to inspect.’ Boromeo hesitated as he caught his brother’s eye, then wrapped him in a firm hug. The boy mounted Onyx and was off ambling through the crowd, whistling as he went.

***

Serge remarked to himself that the Crown Prince’s midsummer progress through the kingdom of Ruritania to his duchy of Mittenheim had more than a little that was festive about it, and he rather approved of the fact. As usual the marshalling of the cavalcade was his task, and as usual he had listened to Willi’s ideas on the subject. So although a company of the Prinzengarde was jogging along as escort to its colonel-in-chief, the troopers all sported bunches of summer roses in their hats, and a large proportion of the ladies of the royal court had joined the progress, ambling through the summer countryside on their mares or in their carriages.

Every evening an encampment of pavilions and tents was set up in fields and on village commons. Bonfires of fragrant applewood perfumed the air while courtiers dined, musicians played and dancing continued late under the stars. Nearby villagers were invited to appear in their peasant dress, the women and youths wearing garlands, and to demonstrate their rustic dance and sing their country songs. The prince feasted them and scattered some of the gold of Basovizza and Trieste amongst them as dowries for any young betrothed couples who were brought to his attention.

‘He’s been getting sentimental since he got Rica pregnant,’ Willi asserted. ‘Then there was the wedding at Glottenburg, and giving away Dodie to young Staszek. Pleasant enough occasion I suppose, but a very disappointing show overall, I have to say.’

‘Ha!’ Serge scoffed. ‘You were just disappointed of the sight of a naked Staszek being publicly bedded with Dodie.’

Willi bridled. ‘Your grandfather’s passion for extinguishing beautiful and venerable customs is quite out of hand. It’s been part of our beloved wedding ritual for centuries. And then on his whim the newly-weds are allowed to hide their youthful charms under linen shifts. Tragic.’

‘Pervert. You deserve all the disappointment you get. Tomorrow it is the 10th of July and we reach the Ebrendt, then the ladies of the court will depart and return to Strelsau. After that the serious business begins. And not before time in my opinion, fun though this pastourelle has been. Clever Willi. It’s done nothing but enhance our lord and master’s popularity amongst his people. The church bells ring out as we ride through each parish and the roads are lined with well-wishers to their prince. You’re laying the groundwork for a glorious reign to come, I think.’

‘What is it they shout in their country speech as we pass, Phoebus?’

‘Bozh fur den Cherven Elphberg! Bozh ehloz den Leuwen zu des Kirche! God for the Red Elphberg! God save the Lion of the Church!’

Karl and Jonas were part of the cavalcade, as also was Andreas, though in his capacity of ensign of the Prinzengarde escort. The two servant boys perched up in a tree one evening, watching the festivities below them.

‘I like this music,’ Jonas decided, kicking his legs to the rhythm. ‘It makes me happy and sad at the same time.’

‘Ando’s in the crowd down there. The young ladies are making him dance with them.’ Karl smiled down at his friend who, it had to be said, was proving to be a quick learner, though he was new to the world of courtly dance.

‘He’s good with girls,’ Jonas pronounced. ‘They don’t make any sense to me.’

‘You like Cecile back home well enough. I saw you chatting away to her ten to the dozen the other day at the wash trough.’

‘That was just us talking about the job we were doing.’

‘Aren’t there elf-girls? There have to be.’

Jonas shook his head. ‘We’re sort of neither boy nor girl. But when I first had to make a body, many, many years ago, it came out boy, and I’ve stuck with it since. It seems to suit me. Maybe if others of my people tried it, they’d come out girl, but very few of us ever put on a body, so I don’t know.’

‘Now there’s a thing,’ Karl mused. ‘You can understand every language spoken at yer, whether it’s German, French, country speech or the Lord Mehmed’s Turkish. Why’s that?’

‘It’s a gift my people have. You have it too, Karlo.’

‘I hadn’t noticed, Jonas.’

‘Just let your ears soak in the sounds without trying to understand them. Relax into it. Meaning will flow into your head. You don’t understand at the moment, because you think you can’t. But you can. It goes with your other gifts. Wilchin has no problem with talking to people in all sorts of languages, wherever he goes. Ask him about it. Now let’s go chat to Brunhild and our other horses; they talk more sense than most humans, in my opinion.’

***

The reception of the Crown Prince in the city of Mittenheim was a very satisfactory demonstration of enthusiasm for the prince, if not necessarily for the House of Elphberg, with cannonades, cheering crowds and elaborate receptions. Willi had already been at work and his new team of bright and talented young under-chamberlains had arrived in the city the previous week. They had instructions to consult with the bishop about renovating and refitting the remarkable Gothic chapel of the Order of the Dragon which the Lutzauers had erected alongside the north choir aisle of the cathedral.

So on Sunday 13 July, the Sixth after Trinity, the bishop and Willi between them could provide a sumptuous inaugural mass for the twelve Knights of the Order, who processed from the new ducal palace through city streets lined with the grenadiers, musketeers and dismounted dragoons of the Mittenheim regiments up to the cathedral of St Michael and All Angels. They passed through the streets to the peal of church bells, in their green robes and white-feathered hats, the star of the order twinkling on their white ceremonial silk doublets. Old General Tedorovic came over from Glottenburg for the occasion, much to the pleasure of the prince and those of his court who had been on the Dalmatian campaign.

Following the mass, Willi masterminded a display of trophies of the battles of Sebenico and Basovizza in the aisles and on the lawn of the cathedral cloister. He had hesitantly suggested to Mehmed that he might dress up for the occasion, but the glare he received from the Turk decided him on the safer option of the ever-popular Turkish band, who banged, brayed and tinkled nicely in their exotic costumes up and down the pillared walks, to the delight of the children present. The prince made a gift to the Burgomeister and Ratsherren of the city of two huge brass bombards taken at Trieste and hauled back to Ruritania. They made a splendid show set on either side of the great arch of the Radhaus opposite the cathedral.

On Monday the business of the prince’s progress began with a ceremonial levée for the nobility of the province in the new palace and a breakfast to follow. Prince Henry and Countess Ulrica saw each of their guests off with a smile and a handshake. As the last left, the prince turned to Willi and let out a long whistle.

‘Thank God that’s done, Willi. Now take Rica and both go find somewhere quiet and put your feet up. You two’ve done your job with style, and now it’s time for me and the generals to do ours. Coming Serge?’

‘As long as I don’t have to get into uniform, sire. Might I suggest we bring Pasha Mehmed along with us. His military opinions are always worth listening to. He has a very original mind, as I’m discovering.’

‘What’s this?’ the prince laughed. ‘You’ve made friends with the Turk who almost skewered you?’

‘I wouldn’t go that far, sire. But I’m finding him more profitable to talk to than I ever expected.’

***

Serge had already had opportunities to notice the major changes that had been made in the fortifications of the city of Mittenheim since their extended visit the previous summer. When he reached the top of their viewpoint on the northwest tower of the cathedral he saw the full ambition of the scheme.

Mittenheim covered a hill within a loop of the river Ebrendt, open only to the east. The former castle had originally closed the approach on that side, but there were vulnerable suburbs across the river to north and west of the city. Fortified lines had been thrown around the suburbs in the dangerous days of the 1640s when the Elphbergs had acquired the duchy and an attempt had been made at the time to upgrade the medieval castle, but fifty years later the state of the strategic city’s defence was rather less than satisfactory.

General Antonovic had a lot to report as they stared down from the cathedral tower. He had set up a map table in the upper chamber and telescopes had been positioned on all sides. ‘Your royal highness will have had plenty of opportunity to observe what has been done around the old castle on the east, which in many ways was the weakest section of the defences,’ he began. ‘The last of the old works were entirely cleared, along with the fortifications of fifty years ago and all that was left standing were the sadly abused remains of the old ducal palace. I hope you approve of the reinstatement of the palace as a modern residence appropriate for a prince.’

‘What say you, my lord Tarlenheim?’ Prince Henry grinned across the table.

‘I can only approve, sire,’ Serge said. ‘The house is a splendid construction of brick and white stone in the best Dutch style. The architect certainly deserved his fee, and the surrounding park is quite an improvement on the jumbled wasteland that part of the city had become. But we are here to look at what is to the east of the park and Residenz, I think.’

‘Yes indeed, my lord,’ the general agreed. ‘And if you gentlemen look down to your east you’ll see that the fortifications on that side of the city have been moved eastward from their former position. This has allowed space for a park to be laid out, but more importantly we had the room to raise formidable citadels on the river banks on either side of the neck of the Ebrendt’s loop, upriver and downriver of the city. Now sirs, if we move to the west you’ll have a fine view of what’s been done to defend the exposed suburbs of Sankt Hubert and Sankt Johann across the river to west and north.’

The officers and courtiers took up position at the windows and telescopes and the general pointed out the much expanded lines of stone wall and glacis around the suburbs, on which Serge could see that work was still continuing.

‘General,’ Mehmed commented, ‘I see that the hills across the river allow a dropping fire on those fortifications across the bridges.’

‘Indeed, your excellency. Thank you for drawing our attention to that. There was some discussion about that question last year, and His Royal Highness authorised the expense of raising a self-contained artillery fort on each eminence. They will be so placed as to offer supporting fire one to the other in an arc to south, west and north of the city. We will ride out in due course to inspect each and meet the surveyors. They are the last of the major works but it’s unlikely they’ll be in full commission before winter, though much progress has been made, as you will see.’

Prince Henry was all but rubbing his hands with glee. ‘This is all excellent news, Antonovic. My father will be as delighted as I am with the progress made so far. Though were he here I imagine he would be gloomily cautioning that enemies never obligingly attack when you are completely prepared for them.’

The heads of the other general officers present snapped up at this. ‘Are we expecting trouble, sire?’ General Dudley asked.

***

Serge, Willi and Mehmed walked out to the lines to the east of the princely Residenz that evening after dinner. It was a fine evening, and the zig-zagging of the ramparts above the scarps and glacis offered a fine place to view the fortifications from several angles. Sentries paced slowly along the lines from bartizan to bartizan.

‘Excuse me, my lords, but I have this suspicion that all this work of fortification around your prince’s city is being undertaken for a purpose,’ Mehmed eventually said.

Willi and Serge exchanged glances, and Serge answered after a shrug from Willi. ‘You’re not wrong, excellency. You’re obviously aware of the way the Christian powers are as keen on fighting each other as they are the Turk.’

Mehmed chuckled. ‘Of course, the constant fratricidal wars amongst you Christians give me hope for when my time comes as Grand Vizier, as it inevitably will.’

‘As modesty is not one of your character traits, I am not surprised at that particular observation, Mehmed,’ Serge scoffed. Mehmed had a talent for getting under his skin.

‘I have noticed this odd perversion among Christian courtiers you call “modesty”,’ Mehmed observed satirically in response. ‘It is of course absurd. It is a mere pretence of incompetence in hopes that people will not take you seriously, so you can lull into complacence the rival you intend to knife in the back.’

Serge shook his head. ‘I don’t think you quite get it, Mehmed’.

‘Excuse me,’ Willi laughed. ‘I think our Grand Turk here gets it very well indeed.’

‘Knifing in the back is not the aim of courtly behaviour, Willi dear.’

‘No, but Mehmed’s right otherwise. Many of our skilful so-called “courtiers” are out for themselves alone, and what we call “courtly behaviour” is just a way of being taken as a good fellow and not seeming nakedly ambitious or threatening. Envy and backbiting is the way of the court, Phoebus, and you know it, even though you don’t share those vices.’

Serge shook his head. ‘I’ll admit a court only works properly when the prince who presides over it is virtuous and educated. We’re fortunate in that regard. Zeus is exactly that sort.’

Willi shrugged. ‘My dear cousin has his virtues, I’ll admit, though they’re concentrated narrowly on the military side of things. But he lives on his wits; he’s not exactly what you’d call educated is he? You and your grandfather have this ideal of an enlightened and rational monarch under whose sway all arts and sciences and true justice will flourish. Ain’t no such creature, Serge dear. It’s a Platonic fantasy.

‘You’re just trying to avoid admitting that the Church’s way of dealing with kings was a better one in its day. The Church gave them an impossible ideal to live up to, then lambasted them for their backsliding. What better king than one who’s living with a tortured sense of inadequacy. A king of any integrity who is like that is at least always trying to be a better man. Your enlightened monarch would be a moral tyrant, admitting no one else’s opinion and justifying all he does by the assumption of his superiority over others.’

Sensing a riposte coming his way, Willi turned hastily to Mehmed. ‘So how do you Ottomans deal with your kings, excellency?’

Mehmed paused in their stroll, and frowned before replying. ‘The Qu’ran has not much to say on the subject of kings, though the Prophet, blessings be upon his name, exalted the ancient Suleiman the Wise, the just king of Israel, as being greater than any other in the ways of Allah, who gave him power even over the jinn and the elements of Earth. But there were no others like him. We have our Khalifah of course, and you call our empire the “Sublime Porte” or “Heavenly Gate” because our emperor may raise the banner of the Prophet, which is in his charge as his successor as Commander of the Faithful, above the outer gate of the Yeni Saray called the Bab-ı Ali.

‘To fulfil such a role our emperor must then be as worthy and learned as was Suleiman of Israel, and he will not be obeyed as if he were a little god, like your western kings. You will know how many of the emperors have been brought low by Allah precisely because of their unworthiness. By the mercy of Allah, the former Emperor Mehmed IV lives on imprisoned to this day in the Cage, deposed by my uncle for his idleness and failures in war, and he was not the first nor will he be the last emperor to be removed in this way, Allah turning his face from him as not fit to rule the Faithful of the Dar al-Islam.’

Willi spread his hands. ‘So there, Phoebus, both the pasha and I have to cordially disagree with you. Rationality and good manners aren’t quite enough to make a good king and a healthy court. It needs the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom, as one of my tutors told me as he beat my skinny rump when I was but seven. It stuck in my mind for some reason.’

Serge shook his head. ‘As usual you resort to superstition. You’re as bad as each other.’

Mehmed frowned. ‘Sir, you refer to faith as superstition. My lord Strelsau, is this man an unbeliever in your Christ as much as in the teachings of the Prophet?’

‘I’m afraid he is, yes.’

Mehmed viewed Serge with some astonishment. ‘I had heard there were such creatures and wondered what I might say to such a one were we to meet. My lord, of all the strange things I have met since my most undeserved capture at the hands of your servant boy – itself a strange event – meeting an infidel like yourself is the strangest. I suppose I ought to slay you like a wild beast, but I’ll leave it to Allah to bring you to a most deserved and hideous end.’

Taken aback by Willi’s deliberate mischief in handing such risky information to one who was hardly to be trusted, charming though his company might sometimes be, Serge had initially been struck speechless. But now he rallied to his own defence. ‘Your excellency will have seen that I worship each Sunday, and observe the fasts of the Church. In all ways I am an obedient Catholic. Willi is merely teasing.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Willi affirmed, though his smug grin rather belied his words. ‘And now I’d suggest we get back to the Residenz in time for a glass of wine before bed. Oh, and Mehmed my dear, I hope you haven’t left poor Hans naked and artistically ... er ... restrained as you did when you left your room yesterday. It took a few bribes to make the house comptroller forget what he’d seen, not that the abject humiliation didn’t add to Hans’s pleasure. But still, I had to lie that he was a Mussulman and it was all a part of his religious practices. Not so strange how he believed me, in retrospect, we westerners are so ignorant in matters of other faiths. You owe me in more ways than one, my dear Pasha.’

***

Serge assisted a more than somewhat tipsy Mehmed back to his room after a late party with some gentlemen of the household. The bottle had come past the Turk rather more than was allowed him at the Sign of the Angel. Serge held him up on one side, and an obliging General Dudley on the other.

‘Of course, dear infidel,’ Mehmed asserted in his ear, in the decided fashion of drunks, ‘I would not actually have put you down like the dog you are. I was just saying ... as one does. You’re a very good looking fellow for an atheist ... isn’t that what they call your sort? Atheists. Those without a god, as those old Greeks put it. Knew a few things those Greeks. Oh yes! Clever bastards. Had a word for everything. You know, you’re a handsome fellow, and if you feel like putting me to bed, well ... don’t stop with just undressing me.’

Serge rolled his eyes. ‘I think I told you clearly enough that I am a loyal son of the Church. Is Hans at liberty to attend to you, Mehmed.’

‘Huh?’

‘Hans? Did you leave him untied?’

‘Oh ... yes ... I think so. Quite a gift he was. He’s begging me to take him back to Köprülü when I’m released, y’know. So wants to be a white slave in my household. Strange boy, but so very pretty and obliging. Even willing to be a eunuch if it’s part of the deal. But where’s the fun in losing your balls, I ask him? You can do so much with them. Strange boy.’

A grinning Dudley rapped the door of the pasha’s room, and an anxious Hans Blicke opened it. ‘Oh you silly pasha!’ he scolded. ‘Drunk again. Thank you gentlemen, I’ll take care of him. He’ll have a terrible headache in the morning. Never listens to me.’

Serge helped heave the pasha on to his bed, then left Hans delightedly stripping his master.

General Dudley was still laughing as they walked back along the corridor. ‘That Turkish boy has the abiding vice of his people. Their great emperor Murat IV was a man so strong that he could lift his attendants above his head and spin them round for his amusement; you’ll recall this was the emperor that subdued Baghdad and the last of them of any personal bravery and military skill. But in the end he was so crazed by drink that they say he would take bowshots at the crews of boats rowing past the kiosks of his palace. And when he was being rowed out in his barge, he had loaded carbines by his side to shoot at anyone foolish enough to look out from their seaside gardens at his passing. In his last days it was said that the drink drove him into such a homicidal frenzy he would escape into the city by a private door and run through the streets with a drawn sword in his bare feet and naked except for a shift, killing any that stood in his way. He was the terror of his city and a name to frighten children with.’

‘Was that story something you learned from your late father, general?’

‘He was in Constantinople long after the time of Murat IV, of course, but in his varied career he picked up so many stories and met so many people. When the mood was on him he could bind you in a spell of storytelling. Your grandfather the Graf Oskar was also quite the raconteur, though I don’t suppose you were ever able to observe that side of him.’

They paused at the grand stairs of the Residenz. Since Dudley was plainly in a conversational mood, Serge encouraged him further. ‘When did you last meet him, general?’

‘Ah, he was in London in ’85, the year I got my first taste of battle. My cousin the new king allowed me a commission as lieutenant for my late father’s sake. I served in the Second Guards as a company commander, and saw my first battle in the Somerset marshes at the age of nineteen as we put down the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth. As battles go it was more of a massacre than the sort of engagement you experienced at Basovizza, the enemy was a mere mob of peasants with scythes and blunderbusses. But still there I was at the head of my company and I ordered my first volleys into an enemy, and saw the welcome sight of their backs.

‘I met your grandfather soon after that not-so-glorious engagement. Sedgemoor had left a bad taste in my mouth. We talked a good deal as we trawled the bookshops of Fleet Street and the Pardon Churchyard. In the end he persuaded me that I might have a better future in the Empire, and so I crossed to the Palatinate and secured an audience with my cousin the Elector, to find that the best I could get out of him was his interest in securing me a commission in the Imperial forces. My legitimate claims on the settlement left me in my father’s will were never going to be met by him, however.’

‘I’m sure that was galling, sir.’

‘I have not forgot my claims, you can be sure. They amounted to 100,000 gold ducats by my calculation. But since then Prince Eugene and Prince Henry between them have brought me on, so I’ve not done too badly. As young Boromeo has also found, success in battle can make up for a lot of the bad luck life throws at you. Still, I was surprised the prince hasn’t made interest with his father that I get the commission as lieutenant general now vacant with the death of Marcovic on the field of Basovizza.’

Serge glimpsed yet again in the Englishman’s face the deep grievances that sometimes broke through his courtly demeanour. He could understand why, but he did not think that it was doing much for him at the court of Ruritania. ‘As I understand it, sir,’ Serge replied ‘His Majesty keeps such appointments close to his chest. Prince Henry has no say in the matter. It was your formidable skills as a quartermaster as well as your valour and the claims of blood that impressed the king and brought you your present commission. My advice, should you be interested in the views of a boy a year younger than you were when you took the field of Sedgemoor, is that you had better pay more attention to the Hofburg than the Marmorpalast, much though I know you value the crown prince’s friendship.’

Dudley frowned down at the parquet floor as he digested this before replying. ‘You’re a wise fellow for an eighteen-year-old, Serge. I’ll bear what you say in mind. I had a letter from your uncle and namesake, the Graf Sergius out at Tarlenheim. He tells me that you and your brother are at law with your father. I was sorry to hear it. He hopes that my influence with Boromeo can bring about some reconciliation.’

‘Boromeo will listen to you, sir, I’m sure. But it’s our father’s mad determination to appropriate Boro’s winnings on the battlefield that can’t be borne, so your efforts would be welcome in that direction.’

The general nodded. ‘You have my word that I’ll use my good offices as far as I can. And perhaps you might sound out the prince for me on the king’s intentions about the promotion.’

Serge was a little nettled at the transactional tone Dudley had adopted towards him. He may have often encountered it around the court, but still it lessened Dudley in his eyes. They nonetheless took a cordial departure of each other and Serge walked pensively up to his bed and an already snoring Willi von Strelsau, who would be receiving a very thorough scolding in the morning for his mad indiscretion. It had been bad enough playing with fire around Mehmed. But then Mehmed had blurted it out in the presence of Dudley, a man whom Serge trusted even less in some ways than he did his involuntary Turkish guest.