Where we see that all awakenings are not of a sensual nature.
Chapter 38: London Discussions
London, Royal Palace, Wednesday the twelfth August. Eighth day
Something cold playing on his face pulled him slowly out of a dreamless night.
Most of his nights were dreamless since he was using drugs to find sleep.
And his massive bulk did nothing to ensure a restful night.
The cold thing continued to stroke his face, his cheeks, until he finally awoke.
He had no need to wonder what was happening.
He knew.
His guest had finally arrived.
"Could you please stop playing with that thing, you could hurt somebody and since I doubt that you would do me the favor of cutting off your head I fear I'm the most probable prospect."
"I had to do something to wake you, Your Highness. A little noise was not sufficient and since I came this far without killing anybody I was reluctant to make my presence known..."
"Kind of you," answered the Prince of Wales. "They are not as good as yours but they are the last I possess."
"Call in the reserve, Your Highness. Let us have some sport!"
The Prince of Wales grunted and began to slowly wiggle his massive bulk.
"Can you help me? I hate conversing while laying prone. I'd like to sit..."
"It will be my pleasure, Your Highness. What's the procedure?"
"Two men to lift me in a sitting position and one to put half a dozen cushions in my back..."
There was a small period of silence.
"Well, I see how we could proceed. Please do not worry I'm not going to kill you."
There was a smothered noise followed by the clonk of a sword point hitting the wood of the panels above his head.
"The cushions are in place, Your Highness. A last little lift and we should be able to speak."
Something wooden was placed into his hands.
"Please hold my scabbard at both its ends with your hands..."
He did what he was told.
"Ready?"
"As I will ever be..."
"Well, than..."
He felt a weight climbing on his bed, the scabbard being pulled and he just held on...
Two seconds later he felt the cushions falling on his bed behind him and himself being pushed back.
It was not perfect but as good as his men servants could do most of the time.
And this d'Arcy had just done it alone.
That was an information he hadn't got yet but it was an important one. This d'Arcy was not only a competent strategist, he was also an athlete. Last time he fell, it had been the work of six guards to help him stand up. He was sure this d'Arcy could have pulled him to his feet all alone. Hateful man!
"Sorry for the hole in the panel," said d'Arcy. "Next time I'll bring better tools. A sword is not the best means for certain domestic jobs..."
The Prince exhaled heavily.
"Don't bother yourself. As I see my situation, you just damaged what will be yours in a few days. No reason for me to be concerned with what is already no longer mine..."
"Should I interpret your last words as a surrender?"
"Of course not... I won't lose my face so easily. I could contemplate a truce and a peace treaty but of course never a surrender..."
He felt that d'Arcy had jumped back on the floor.
He had done it without making a noise.
An athlete and an acrobat...
He couldn't help but hate this man with every fiber of his being. For what he knew, this man was even older than himself and he had the sheer gall to be, at forty two, everything that he never had been and -he was sure of it- never could be...
"You should eat less and train, Your Highness," said d'Arcy who -how could he dare- could also read thoughts. "You wouldn't mold yourself into a real warrior but you could come back to a more human shape..."
He chuckled.
"To be on the run, it's easier..."
He decided not to enter into that sort of game. He had a keen intellect but he was in no way willing to get the proof that his enemy was also brighter than himself.
"Could you light a lamp?" asked the Prince. "I won't be a problem, I promise. But I really like it to see the faces of the men I speak to..."
There was a little rasping noise and a flame appeared just at his right where his servants always placed his candelabrum.
A few seconds later they were looking at each other.
"If I shout you will kill me..."
"Probably not. You're too useful. Then it depends on what happens next. If nobody steers, you'll probably come out of it with a headache. But if they come storming at me, I'll hurt you in oder to make you cry -so that they know that you are alive and forfeit using fireweapons- and then I'll have to kill all the guards who will come to your rescue. And when it is done and the last one is out or fleeing, I'll let it be known that you are without protection. And I'll stay to have a good look at the hanging..."
The Prince of Wales was quite unsure if his counterpart was joking or not. He didn't look like joking.
"That's not very kind..."
D'Arcy's smile became more impish.
"You should try being loved and admired... Bonaparte knows that part backwards!"
"Too late for that, I fear. I was never loved and I will never be admired. You' ll have to deal with me, there's nobody else."
D'Arcy nodded.
"I'm already aware of that!'
They looked at each other.
"Your Highness, you invited me by kidnapping somebody you knew I care for and that could have been very upsetting. But since it seems she was treated very kindly, I'm able to choose to remain calm. If we add to the kindness of your hospitality the fact that you did not lay out a real trap, I'm rather open to a little friendly chat. I suppose that was what you had in mind."
The Prince nodded.
"It was never my intention to try to capture you. I wanted to know you and I was sure you wouldn't resist the temptation to come 'rescue' her and if the possibility presented itself to come and brag in front of me."
D'Arcy bowed.
"So you read me rightly. I'm impressed! But you should have been more careful with your guest's watchers. I was quite angry to find those men peeping at her. I was tempted to cut their heads and wake you with their blood!"
"Thank God you choose otherwise. Are they still alive..."
"She wouldn't have liked it if I'd killed them. So I only knocked them out. Perhaps a little harshly, but they are all still alive..."
"We prepared no trap, I'll give you my word if you want. I wanted to see you, to speak to you. There's no better way to judge an enemy that to have the opportunity to speak to him."
He winked at d'Arcy.
"And sometimes you even get an opening to bribe him. Who knows?"
D'Arcy could only nod. Sometimes indeed you got real opportunities. But that ran both sides.
"If you surrender now, I could probably manage to ensure you and your family an acceptable way to make a strategic retreat to the destination of your choice..."
"No doubt, you could, monsieur d'Arcy. But you you know very well that I cannot surrender. Not with how I'm seen by my people. I must play the role of the last defender of the Empire. If I want to have a chance to reign someday on these lands, it's my job to stay and fight..."
D'Arcy shook his head and sat on his doctors armchair. At one time he had displaced it to put it near the window. Probably to be near his chosen exit.
"Don't be a fool. You have no real choice and you know it. My troops are already occupying the south of England and we have begun to go North. With no troops to counter me you'll be besieged in London within a month. And don't count on the other European monarchies. They will know what's in their best interest. And helping a vanquished England won't be on their agenda for a very long time. The British Empire is alone, Your Highness, and with all your troops in India you'll have nothing to stop us in our invasion."
D'Arcy sat up and bent towards the bed.
"I have already won, Your Highness. The only reason I am not overrunning you is my desire to limit civilian casualties. If my goal had been the destruction of the land it could already have been done. There's nothing left..."
George wouldn't agree even if it was the truth.
"The will to fight is still there! Great Britain will not go down without a last fight..."
D'Arcy shook once more his head.
"Great Britain has no army worth a dam. Your militias will fight if you order them to and I'll destroy them. You could probably try to hire mercenaries but do you really believe a mercenary captain will accept to throw his troops in an already lost fight?"
D'Arcy stood up and wandered along the walls looking at the Prince's fine collection of paintings.
"The Empire is over extended, Your Highness. With foreign troops already ashore you've lost all possibilities to turn the tide. Even more so because of the mistrust the British people feel against you. They would follow a charismatic leader. But you?"
He looked at the bulk of the Heir of the throne.
"Do you really believe you are the leader who will be able to summon them around him?"
He shook his head.
"I wouldn't follow someone who is nicknamed the whale or the walrus... And I heard a few more sobriquets I would not dare to repeat in front of you... When the magnitude of my victory is known there will be no one left to accept to die for an obese German prince who's a customary patron to all of London's whores..."
That last remark did hurt but George would never accept his defeat on that particular point.
"Only the funny ones," countered he. "And in my world going to the whores is not considered a faute de goût..."
"There exist the same rules in the world of the tomcats but they are righteous enough not to try to convince the rest of the world that they are superior beings!"
"God," whistled the Prince. "Your tongue is sharper than your funny sword..."
"A souvenir of my Asian studies. I learned everything about the sword and even more about the power of words. I suppose my aunt did give you all the details about both?"
There was a lull in the conversation.
How could he know about his aunt's letter? Who was spying for him? Or was the better question: who was not?
George decided the silence was not to his benefit.
"She did!" answered he with a smile. "She has quite a few interesting opinions on rather extraordinary matters."
"Even if her advice on strategic matters are worth looking at, do never forget that she is a dangerous snake with poisoned fangs. And she's the worst gossip I have ever encountered."
"Welcome to the world of family relations! I have brothers I'd like to hide to the world so dumb they are. And my father is as crazy as it comes."
"I hear he has his moments of intelligence."
"And that's the worst of it. Some of his counselors are literally waiting upon his windows of clear sight to undermine my decisions. Each time they can, they come back on taken decisions with parts of speeches of my father which had the semblance of sanity..."
D'Arcy looked at the Prince through half closed eyes.
"If this was just a demand to see your father dispatched, please be more precise in your demands. I could do it... I could have done it with my own father, I won't hesitate with the crazy father of some one else..."
The Prince gave himself a few minutes to bask in the perspective of being King and never again having some one speaking against him because some of his father's babble could be considered as an order.
But no, he could not let himself follow that peculiar path.
"You would like it, wouldn't you?"
"Indeed, I would. It would give me such great opportunities to slander your name. You'd be the most hated King of all England's history..."
D'Arcy smiled a snake's smile.
"But you would be King," he singsonged. "It's perhaps worth the public hatred."
D'Arcy came and sat on his bed. He had plenty of space to put his light frame on it.
"I could even made it look as if one of your brothers would have been the murderer. Which one do you want to see beheaded?"
George denied his inner wish with a powerful shake of the head.
No he would not let himself be manipulated...
He was the manipulator.
"You're quite the Devil, monsieur d'Arcy..."
"Only one of his tools, Your Highness. As you are yourself..."
George decided that was not a topic he wanted to discuss with this man.
"Since you're here, let's speak of your goals. What will you do in the near future?"
"Apart from taking hold of all of Great Britain?"
"That I already have made up!"
D'Arcy looked at the face of his counterpart.
Why not? There were informations he could share without risking to lose his momentum.
"Let's begin with my academic prospects..."
He smiled at the Prince questioning eyes.
"I was able to come as fast as tonight because I was in Oxford where I had a long chat with the deans and professors of the University. And since I know that one of my armies has entered Cambridge, the same must have happened there."
"The same?"
"We're preparing a removal. Within a month, all of your famous teachers will be sailing with their books and apparata to Corsica where the French Republic is creating world's greatest University. We will invite there Europe's scientists and scholars. Beginning with your esteemed British scientists. They'll love the climate change, I'm sure..."
The Prince of Wales looked at him with surprise in his eyes.
"Why would you do such a thing? Why deport all these scholars?"
"As a matter of fact I'm deporting all your elites, Your Highness. The scientific elite is just privileged because they go to Corsica and not to Louisiana. I have studied a very long time and I came to the conclusion that to further scientific progress one needs a concentration of minds! We will regroup the best minds of the world and we will finance their researches and we will get such an advantage that it will take a long time to anybody to catch up..."
The Prince of Wales chuckled.
"And this deportation had nothing to do with their refusal to let you in twenty five years ago?"
"Of course it has. They did me a great service and I'm paying back. They don't know it yet but I'm going to transform their lives and the future of all mankind. In less than a year they will thank me..."
"As will Great Britain?"
D'Arcy could only shrug.
"I'm no Pythias, I have no idea of what the future will be portent of. I'll do my best to convince the people of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland that French rulers are in no way worse than Hanoverian ones..."
The Prince shook his head.
"You really don't like us."
"I don't like leeches. My father was one of the worst, I know everything about them. There should be virtue in a ruler's line. And, from what I can judge, there's none in Britain's reigning Dynasty."
"You see some elsewhere?"
D'Arcy shook his head.
"There you have a point. Most of Europe's rulers are not worth the bullet to shoot them. Perhaps young Nicolas of Russia. He believes in reforms and more participation by the people."
"He should! His land is the most despotic land spot of Europe. And where do you found virtue in a regicide?"
"From all the informations I could get, he has nothing to do with his father's demise. The old king was killed by a group of discontent Boyards who believed that the son would be easier to handle. They'll soon understand their mistake."
"You look also at Russia?"
"I look at the whole world, Your Highness. This world is dying because of too much rulers. What this world need is more peace and less Monarchs. I'll do my best to give it both."
"With Napoleon as a ruler?"
"Why not? He has shown that he has the backbone and the foresight to be a real ruler. All right, he's not perfect. He likes money and women and power. Not unlike some Hanoverian Prince Regent, isn't he? But, contrary to you, he has proven that he has the know-how to be loved by his troops and his people..."
Finally, he shook his head.
"But who's the ruler is not the important thing. I'll support anyone who knows how to rule a country, how to manage an economy and how to treat justly his people. If he has these qualities, I could renounce at his being virtuous. But it would be with lots of regrets..."
"Are you virtuous?"
"No, but then I know that it would be way too dangerous to let me rule the world! That's too powerful a job to give to someone like me. I would surely abuse the power coming with it. Better for the world with me being the ruler's best henchman..."
He stood up and went to the candelabrum.
"I'm sorry but I have another job awaiting me... I fear it's time for me to go."
He looked a last time at the prince of Wales.
"I'll be awaiting a proposition. I'll keep Duroc on leash for a few days more. He won't accept much more. He will not come directly against London. He is a great believer in the role model of a bloody example. He'll burn down one of the suburbs first. But not for a few more days. You should use this time to think about my proposition. I would accept to let you, your family and what's left of your followers and soldiers bail out of Great Britain. There would be conditions but not too harsh ones... Think about it..."
With one stroke he drew his sword and extinguished all five candles.
"Nicely done..." said George. "You could have done it normally, I'm already quite impressed."
There was no answer.
He waited a few seconds and decided that d'Arcy was gone. Or discreetly watching over him.
He pulled the cushions out from under him and did his best to lie down.
He would speak tomorrow morning with his guards.
He knew already that they were not the best but they could have made an effort.
He could be dead after all.
And that idea was not pleasant.
A few seconds later he was fast asleep and a silent shadow left the darkness of the room to climb through the open window.
Next chapter: Pemberley Family