Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
They were summoned to the Emperor’s study, which was a simple room, tapestried with sea green wallpaper and golden borders, and walnut cabinets lining the walls. A simple desk lined with green baize covered the top, on which were a pile of paper and an inkstand.
It could have been the working room of any other bureaucrat, functional, unadorned, and rather plain.
The emperor himself was standing behind it, frowning when they entered. He wore a dark blue coat, breeches and boots, a pair of golden spectacles that had slid down to the tip of his nose, and his white hair was carefully combed.
Next to him was Metternich, in the middle of a lengthy elocution, which he interrupted when they entered. “Ah. There they are.” He made a curt bow. “Your Imperial Highness. Fr?ulein Cranwell.”
Pippa stared at the Emperor and felt her jaw drop.
Good heavens! It couldn’t be. “You!” Then she realised she was committing a grave faux pas, coloured, curtsied, and corrected herself, “Your Majesty.”
Consternation overcame her, and she hardly knew where to look, nor how to behave.
The gardener’s stern features softened. “My friend from the greenhouse. Did you enjoy the sleigh ride?” He stepped forward and took her icy hand in his.
Pippa struggled to form coherent words.
Klemens’ gaze passed from Pippa to his father and back again. “You know each other?”
“Indeed. We met on my rooftop garden and had a most illuminating chat. Twice, I believe. I cannot recall ever having been so thoroughly entertained.” The Emperor regarded her with a twinkle in his eyes.
“I, I didn’t, I mean, I honestly did not know, Your Majesty,” Pippa breathed. “I would never have dreamed—I would never have dared—oh dear. I believed you to be just an ordinary gardener.” Her mind raced back through their conversations, reviewing every word she’d uttered.
She placed her hands on her burning cheeks. “Oh dear. The things I have said!”
“Nothing that you have to be ashamed of. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversations.” He patted her hand, then led her to a settee, where he invited her to sit down. “As well as your thoughts on certain matters, for which I am profoundly grateful.”
Klemens looked bemused. “What matters have you been discussing?”
“Plants,” Pippa said, struggling for composure.
“Quite right,” his father nodded. “Fr?ulein Cranwell’s observations on the state and proper care of my, err, plants, were particularly astute.”
“Plants.” Metternich lifted an amused eyebrow as he sat down next to her. “It must have been a deeply illuminating conversation.”
“Indeed, Metternich. Your talents may be varied, but I do not believe they include gardening.” The Emperor sniffed, as if he considered that to be a great character defect.
“It is an activity I happen to hold in high esteem. But aside from Fr?ulein Cranwell, I do not expect anyone to understand this.”
The Emperor took the armchair across from the settee. That left Klemens standing awkwardly in front of them, without a place to sit, shifting his weight like a schoolboy called before the headmaster.
“Young woman, we shall discuss your horticultural insights later. But first—” the Emperor pointed a finger at Klemens, and his voice turned severe. “We must discuss this disgraceful son of mine. What is this latest scandal I hear involving you?”
Klemens scowled. “Which scandal do you refer to, Majesty? There are plenty to choose from.”
Metternich leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs and regarded his fingernails with studious interest.
Pippa chewed worriedly on her lower lip, and gripped her shawl with both hands.
“The latest one, you reprobate. What did you say to chase the Grand Duchess away? It is causing a diplomatic rift between Austria and Russia.” He wagged a finger at him.
Klemens stiffened, clearly stung. “With all due respect, I said nothing at all. Her running away was entirely of her own machination. If this is causing a diplomatic rift, it is certainly not of my doing. I never even saw her after the engagement was announced. Kovacz eventually found her in a church in Baden, just after she’d married someone else. ”
“And why, by my crown, wasn’t I informed of this announcement?” his father bellowed.
Metternich cleared his throat delicately. “That may have been my doing.”
“Explain yourself.” The Emperor’s voice could have frozen the Danube in July.
Metternich spread his hands in an elegant gesture.
“Given the increasing discordance with the Tsar, I believed it to be the best step for all of us to formalise the engagement. Alas, none of us knew that the Grand Duchess had a secret but passionate attachment to someone else. It has indeed been confirmed that she married her lover this very morning. A cavalry officer, I believe. Quite romantic, really.”
“That is a diplomatic blunder of such immense proportions, and so entirely not in your usual smooth way, Metternich, that I am wondering whether it might have been intentional.” A loaded pause ensued, during which Metternich examined an invisible speck on his immaculate cuff. “Am I right?”
Metternich cleared his throat. “The Russians have become a millstone around our necks. It had become imperative for us to extricate ourselves from this union. By prompting the Grand Duchess to act first, it released us from a rather tricky situation.” He spread his hands.
“She was taken unawares by this announcement as well. This was intentional. The abruptness caused her to panic and show her true colours. She eloped with her lover that very night. The Russians have lost face, and we shall, of course, be gracious enough to overlook this faux pas on their side for the sake of maintaining the peace so that this congress may continue as planned. Most magnanimous of us, really.”
“It is as I thought, then. You wanted to manipulate and outwit the Tsar.” The Emperor turned to stare at his son. “And you? What do you have to say on this matter?”
Klemens, who’d remained standing, shifting from one foot to the other like a restless colt, returned his gaze wide-eyed.
“Nothing at all, Majesty. I mean, how terribly unfortunate for the Grand Duchess to be so overcome by a passion that she would be prompted to do such a thing. Her reputation in tatters and all. Tragic, really. But, as Metternich said, maybe it was, ultimately, for the best?”
“What is this that I hear about you promising marriage to a woman and not keeping your word?” his father thundered.
Klemens stiffened. “What?”
“And I don’t mean the Grand Duchess. Well?” The Emperor glared at him.
Pippa dug her fingers into the armrest, the brocade rough beneath her gloves. She made a sound of protest, but the Emperor’s brusque hand movement to quiet her indicated that it was not yet her turn to speak.
“Did you, or did you not, make a promise of marriage,” the Emperor’s finger wandered from Klemens to Pippa, “to this young lady, here?”
Klemens’ gaze met Pippa’s and held it. Something softened in his expression, a vulnerability she’d rarely seen. “I certainly did.” He clasped his hands behind his back as if to support himself.
His father looked at him sternly. “And you did so all the while knowing you would be betrothed to the Grand Duchess.”
Klemens pulled himself up stiffly. “I did not. The Grand Duchess was not even in the picture then.”
“Whether she was or was not is not the issue. You did so knowing it would be your duty as an archduke to marry someone else. Someone suitable. Someone of rank.”
“Pippa is more than suitable for me, and I care not about rank.” He set his jaw, a muscle ticking beneath the skin.
But his father ignored his interjection.
“You did so knowing all along that such a union would be frowned upon by every crowned head in Europe. You did so knowing that this young woman’s background would be considered by all and sundry to be unsuitable.
Her father was considered to be a Jacobin sympathiser. ”
“He was not!” Pippa shot up, her indignation overcoming her awe. “I swear it on my life, Your Majesty, my father believed in progress and education, but he never—”
The Emperor lifted a finger, and she fell silent, though her cheeks remained flushed with emotion. “Young woman, I am talking to my son now. Well, what do you have to say?”
Klemens walked over to Pippa, held out his hand and drew her up to him so that both remained standing before the Emperor, a united front against the world, while Metternich dangled his quizzing glass from his fingers in a vaguely bored manner, though his eyes missed nothing.
“You are correct in that I have promised marriage to her; that her background may be deemed unsuitable; and that expectations of my marriage would have been different. I have decided that my love for Pippa overrides all that. It will and shall overcome all that.” His voice grew stronger with each word.
“As for her background, she may be a commoner, but I do not care. From this day, I claim no title but my name, Klemens Lindenstein, and no allegiance but to the woman I love. I shall relinquish my title and inheritance if that is what it takes for us to be together.”
“No, Klemens!” Pippa vehemently shook her head. “I won’t have you take such a step. I forbid it.”
“Hear, hear,” Metternich murmured.
The Emperor dropped his head into his hands with a groan. “You are intent on bringing me to an early grave.”
“No, Father, far from it. But I do not consider Pippa’s background to be something to be ashamed of at all.
Her father was someone I highly esteemed, and I consider him one of the greatest intellects of our time.
I learned much from him, about mathematics and the natural sciences, yes, but also about integrity and honour.
He may have been liberal-minded, but he was not a radical.
He certainly was not a Jacobin sympathiser. And neither is Pippa.”
“I know that.” The Emperor drummed his fingernails on his armrest.