episode 7
PPD made big eyes at the Guest, gesticulating that under no circumstances must she include Safiya in their adventure. He was struggling with Mata's feminine guiles and subterfuge, leaving them permanently guessing as to her whereabouts on the beetle train, compounded by unexplained long periods of absence. She was a slippery one, as secretive as a mute Monk from Mongolia!
He caught a quick nap between the white noise of the Guest babbling in her sleep, the tinkling bells of Mata's jewellery and the hum of the engine. All of a sudden the Guest prodded him sharply.
"OB, wake up!"
"What's happened?" "Ve have riched, and it is beeyootiful!" proclaimed Mata.
PPD peeped out of the pod, pretty positive of the potentially puzzling propositions promised to them. They were in the most stunning winter wonderland! A river ran through the city in front of them, and giant green floes floated along, like majestic royal barges. The Guest gasped! "This must be Stockholm!" she exclaimed. It was like nothing she had ever seen before. The snow, the ice, the starkness of white contrasting with the clearest of blue skies.
"Let us go into the seetee and see vhere egzackly ve are," dictated Mata, walking off in quick steps.
They quickly followed after her retreating figure and found themselves at the foot a a huge wraught iron gate. The imperial guards outside stood unmoving, stern, their blind eye lashes not so much as blinking across their pale blue, norse eyes.
The Guest pushed PPD ahead, and PPD cleared his throat nervously.
"Excuse me, where are we?" he asked.
The guard gave him a stony glare. "Stockholm, Sweden. This is the Palace of King Charles the XIV and today is his coronation. Please leave if you are not invited."
"Ovcourse we are invited!" whispered Mata furiously.
She pulled the trio into a tiny by-lane next to the Castle, and stumbled upon a shop selling clothes. "In five minutes we will all be ready, and "invited!""
Ten minutes later they came out looking every inch the role!
PPD looked dapper in his suit.
The Guest looked gorgeous in hers.
Mata Hari looked the most stunning, with her natural good looks and curvy figure.
"It looks like Cinderella is going to the ball, after all!" teased the Guest. "Want some kajal?" she offered.
"I haven't put kajal in 147 years," said PPD. "And I'm unlikely to start."
The trio, this time round, was bowed to, deeply, when they entered the imperial palace.
"Welcome your highnesses," said the liveries.
"Thank you thank you nodded the trio," acting their roles to perfection.
They entered a sprawling corridor, the size of a badminton court, flanked on either side by members of European nobility. The year was 1810, and General Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, a French general had been adopted by the ailing King Charles and was to installed on the throne of Sweden.
Mata Hari, PPD and the Guest blended in with the crowd in one side, and watched with awe as the guests came walking down the aisle. A fearce looking man with wild unkempt hair marched down with an ear trumpet. "Thats Beethoven!" said the Guest, excitedly digging her nails into PPD's arm. PPD swallowed his scream and watched the eccentric man take his seat. A heavily powdered short man with a limp soon followed. It was the French Ambassador Talleyrand. Just then the crowd went silent, and the royal couple their highnesses King Charles and the Queen entered followed by a huge procession of noblemen and women. Trumpeters regaled them with their sonorous cries, and the church bells rang furiously from above.
"I hope this union brings us peace with France and the rest of Europe," sighed a lady next to them. "And maybe, we can get Finland back," said her friend ruefully.
PPD and the Guest exchanged side long glances. "The Swedes lost Finland to the Russians," they whispered to Mata Hari, who looked quite lost. "And the newly crowned king was an old French Marshal, who is being adopted by this childless Royal couple."
Mata Hari looked spell bound by the occasion and watched the entire scene intently. The priests from the ancient church blessed the couple and the royal family, one of the oldest in Europe, the Hapsburgs, looked critically at the young French couple. "It is the first time a foreigner is being "adopted" and brought to rule over a sovereign monarchy, you see," explained PPD to Mata. "Europe is changing in many ways, and we are privy to one of the most critical relationships in history. With the French revolution changing the way people think, to Napoleon picking up the crown of France from the gutter, and placing it on his own head (!) it is a turbulent time."
Mata Hari and the Guest gaped at the finery around them. The Hapsburg dynasty looked cold, ancient and distant. Years of inbreeding had left them with poor health, and the current ailing King looked like a waft of the cold air from an open window would have blown him straight into a coffin. General Bernadotte knelt before him devotion. "My dearest father," he said, kissing his hands.
"My son!" trembled the old King.
The Guest could not take her eyes of Mr. Ludvig van Beethoven who was witnessing the entire scene from a vantage point next to Talleyrand. She could only imagine what great composition was playing out in his mind, while the wheels of history turned resolutely ahead .....
------- to be continued