The Princess and the Cop Read online

  ‘Her Royal Highness is an amazing woman, who was amazingly brave out there in the bush. Most women I know would have been terrified, and crying, but she trusted me and showed no fear and I knew that this was a woman to be respected and, by then, to be loved. We were parted and then reunited and then parted again. I didn’t look for her because I thought the difference in our stations in life was too great. But, as soon as I saw her again, I realised that all that counted for nothing. And it never will!’

  There, I’d done it.

  At the end of it all and as I prepared to escort my bride to our bedchamber, I went to carry her, but Tessa said, ‘No, darling. My gown is going to be shown all over Europe and then your uniform and the gown will be displayed here at the Palace for people to come and admire. Sorry, mate, we have to hoof it. I’m so tired, darling.’

  And so was I, but she’d had the bigger burden. When we got to the bedchamber I helped her hang up her dress and disengage the coronet and the veil, take down her hair, and carefully store her coronet, shoes and stockings and gloves. An artificial bridal bouquet would be prepared because Tess had carefully guided her throw of the real one to my niece, Ellie, 12 years old, and now a very important person in her family and soon at her school back in Queensland.

  While I was caring for my uniform, Tess went for a shower and was lying on the bed, awaiting me, by the time I got to the shower. When I emerged, tired but randy, she was fast asleep. So much for Royal weddings! But even fast asleep, she felt me move in beside her and put an arm across with a small murmur and we both slept. But the dawn broke, we opened our eyes and discovered each other and all was well.

  Tessa said, caressing my face with her soft hand, ‘We are married and we are married and there’s a huge cloud of happiness over us. Please, darling, let’s just wait for it to come down to us and give to us all that we’ve been waiting for since the Jillaroo School. We are complete, aren’t we, my beloved husband?’

  ‘Complete, my loved Princess.’

  We had a marvellous second honeymoon---or was it a third--- around Europe and, for a time, in the small royal lodge, well out in the mountains of Bassenburg. She showed me how to fish for trout and we went shooting for stag, me reluctantly, and although I had one in my sights, I didn’t pull the trigger. Tessa was greatly disappointed as was the gamekeeper who’d tracked it. But I calmly pointed out that, on this matter, we would differ. I’d shoot for food, if necessary, but not for the sake of demonstrating what a good shot I was. And I was! I could shoot at a target for that.

  She, who’d been brought up and taught to shoot deer, did not understand. It was part of their culture. This was worrying because she was usually so quick to understand this type of thing.

  ‘As I understand it, Tessa, if I shoot it, you, as the experienced one, should initiate me by painting my face with its blood?’

  ‘Yes, darling. That is the custom here.’

  ‘I love you dearly, my princess, but that’s about the last thing I’d permit anyone to do to me, even you. I’ve had enough blood in my life, thanks. Any time the shooting of one of these magnificent animals comes up, find someone else, please? And I don’t want to be there.’

  She looked at me in dismay and began to cry. I hadn’t wanted that. I never wanted to make her cry. But here I had!

  I held her tight. Soon she said, ‘I am a stupid wife. I am insensitive. I should have thought of all that and cared for my husband. Please, please forgive me, darling. Erasure for that, please, Barton?’

  ‘Sure, darling!’

  Later, the same stag came into view near the cabin as we were having our morning coffee on the terrace. I looked at Tessa and she was staring, fascinated, at the great animal as it moved through the trees and the boulders. It came very close to the terrace.

  Eventually it moved off, majestically.

  I had thought before, that Tess and I were still going to have our first disagreement over blood sports of this nature, but, after the stag had gone, she came over to me, sat beside me and snuggled in, saying, ‘I think I might have a lot to learn from you, my wonderful, wonderful man. Our old ways might not always be the best. It’s too beautiful to destroy!’

  And I held her gently.

  Gerhardt and Sophie came out to us for lunch---trout caught with my own fair hands. Aha! I hear you say. But there’s no comparison between a stag and a trout.

  It was a most enjoyable occasion until I spoiled it.

  I was watching these two beautiful young people at the table and some devil made me say, ‘And when are you two going to make us all happy, and get together. We’ve been waiting for a long time.’

  There was a frozen, embarrassed silence. Gerhardt looked down at the table. Sophie looked down at the table and Tessa looked at me with ice-chip green eyes. I smiled happily back at them and said, ‘Well, it had to be brought out into the open. You both plainly are in love with each other and I’d hate to see you muck everything up like I nearly did with Tessadonna. Without her, I don’t think we’d be married now. One of you must speak up.’

  The party broke up then—almost in silence, while our two visitors went to their car. Kisses for Her Royal Highness and a terse goodbye for Knight Barton.

  I called, ‘I apologise if I need to. But it’s obvious to me. Please think about it?’

  Tessa could go at it when she wanted to and she wanted to on this day. Nicely, but firmly. It was none of my business was the general tenor of her lecture.

  I absorbed it all in silence. We went to bed in silence, backs to each other, until I rubbed my foot gently on her leg. She flung herself around and held me tightly. I went to lift her chin to look at her but she hid her face, and that’s how we went to sleep.

  The next day, Sophie rang early in the morning to say that, on the way home, they’d stopped the car, talked out their future, made love that night and now were engaged and could people of our stations be Matron of Honour and Best Man?

  That evening, as we took a drink on the terrace, waiting for the stag to appear, Tessa came and stood behind me, arms around my neck and her beautiful head pressed against mine and said, ‘How do you do it, magic man? What is it about you forthright Australians that always seems to work?’

  ‘I think it must be the company I keep. And that’s us Australians, my beloved.’

  The wedding was magnificent and, now that I was getting used to this speech-making gig, I even ran a few Aussie jokes about life in the bush from my time as a stock squad detective, chasing cattle rustlers with even a few shots being exchanged, and, I’m glad to say, I got their silent attention. Tessa stared up at me in fascination, clutching my hand tightly.

  21.

  After about six months, one night, lying in bed in thought, I asked Tessa how much money she had. She didn’t reply and I thought that perhaps I’d overstepped. But no! She laughed and said, ‘Trying to decide whether to stay on, are you, my love?’

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘these things have to come up some time. I don’t come cheaply, you know!’

  She was silent for a long time and then, ‘The truth is, I don’t know, Bart. I asked David some time ago and he didn’t know either.’

  ‘Who handles your money?’

  ‘The counsellors.’

  A little alarm bell rang.

  ‘And they have been for centuries, I gather? The von Prambergs must have billions. Don’t you worry about money?’

  She said, ‘And it’s here that I offend thee, Sir Knight. No, we don’t. It’s always there and, as long as it’s there, we’re secure and happy. And now you’re going to spoil all that, aren’t you?’

  ‘What if they’ve been stealing it from you for centuries? Where do they earn their money?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think they’ve ever earned it. Like ours, it’s always been there. Ours originally came from land rentals and various taxes, I believe, until one of my forebears decided we had enough, so all that was abandoned. And then it built up over the many, many years. Please, Bart, leave th
ings alone. It’s all going so well.’ This, with the greenblue eyes pleading.

  I said, ‘Whatever oaths I took to uphold law and order and all that stuff, Tessadonna, apply all over the world, not just in Australia. I don’t want to spoil things but I also have to be true to myself. But, more than that, darling, I must protect the ones I love, the one I love. I won’t go further if that’s what you wish but I feel that I should at least have a quiet look into it. After all, I’m a part of the family now, aren’t I? Is it now my money too?’

  In a small voice, ‘Yes, and I know what you’re saying, and you’re starting to get bored aren’t you. I’ve been waiting for this, dreading this moment when you will seek a challenge and the honeymoon will end. I wanted it to go on forever, or at least until we have a child. It’s a mystery, isn’t it? Both strong and healthy and fertile but our small one won’t appear.’

  ‘Patience, Tessadonna, and the honeymoon will never end, even if I have to take up stamp-collecting. But let’s have a go at this, just for a bit of fun?’

  If I’d taken the chance to reflect I would have sponsored a longer and deeper discussion with her. But I was the Policeman and no infraction can pass unnoticed or ignored. Never mind the feelings of others, even my wife.

  ****

  She was, in fact, close to the truth about my boredom. But it wasn’t a serious thing to me. She had enlarged her study to include a desk for me, and most mornings, and sometimes, all day, we worked at the various papers that came across them. But Tessa was the ruler and her decisions were far more important than mine, which had more to do with inconsequential matters of leisure and social events, than affairs of State. My tasks were finished quickly and I surreptitiously watched her at work, absorbed, and unmindful of my loose end. Sometimes I left the office without her being immediately conscious of it.

  Once, I got a bit miffed and went for a long ride, returning well after lunch. Tess had been out looking for me and she knew.

  We had a long talk that afternoon, holding each other, but nothing changed, and, indeed, couldn’t change, and we both knew it. Her equal I might be, but a ruler I was not.

  After a great deal of hesitation about the money thing, she suddenly adopted my plan with enthusiasm. Later I knew that she was trying to answer my need to counter the boredom, the supportive wife. We conferred with David and she, the stronger one, prevailed upon him, and he agreed.

  They asked how we’d go about it, but I’d already thought that out.

  So Tessa and I went to Vienna for two weeks. It wasn’t all work. There were opera and ballet, she’d brainwashed me in that area, and fine dining.

  But, in all of that I interviewed applicants for a forensic accountant and a private detective to work for us in an office in Vienna. I’d be a constant visitor and my wife questioned our parting like that. But I soothed her, again intent on having my way. I brought the brilliant Gerhardt into it and we were away. Tessa kept kissing me, or rather, kissing the new, enlivened Bart Corrigan, she said, and we were once again cloaked in love. I was happy and Tess was happy. Soon the counsellors would not be happy, I thought.

  ****

  Her Royal Highness came into things very quickly. I’d found a couple of pearls in my staff appointments and they found the banks which had dealt with the von Pramberg funds for centuries, which the modern von Prambergs had never known and had never cared about. There were four banks, two of them Swiss. The arrangement was tangled and we’d find out whether that was deliberate. Nothing surprised me now.

  The accounts were administered by the six counsellors, with no auditors, what fun they must have had, and the banks refused to co-operate without the consent of the counsellors.

  So we laid it on. Tessa dressed nearly to the tiara and diamonds stage and we invaded the banks. She was magnificently imperious and ordered the banks to divulge the information we wanted.

  David was absent and Tessa said he was a golf fanatic and had a tournament nearby. He’d told her that whatever we decided was alright by him. But I felt that he should have been with us. Strength in unity!

  The banks were stubborn, so Gerhardt rushed off to his judge, got injunctions, for Austria and Switzerland, and the bank authorities crumbled and acknowledged Tessadonna’s control. They didn’t know the half of it.

  Tessa cancelled all authorities for the counsellors to operate on the accounts, and that took some doing, going back centuries to dusty, crumbly documents. Then our forensic accountant employed as many other accountants as he wished and they began to put the cleaners, so to speak, through the murky operations that marked the Royal family’s wealth. And how revealing it was? It seemed that, as far as these funds were concerned, a sort of droit de seigneur prevailed. Help yourself!

  Injunctions were sought and fought, but we had the whip hand. After all it was Royal money and the courts so ruled. The counsellors were nearing panic, blaming me, according to Gerhardt. He obtained a small gun for me and I wore it concealed, without Tessa’s knowledge.

  And it was all boggling. They’d wiggled billions over the many years and there were still billions left. We were told that, if the Princess chose to withdraw the money, or even spend it over a period, she could change the shape of economies and drive certain banks into collapse. And that applied to the previously aloof David too. When he became aware of it all, he was with us, boots and all.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind doing that,’ said my for once grim-faced wife, talking of her sudden financial power, ‘to punish them for what they’ve done to us. But I won’t. I’ll take your advice, darling. You were right and I’m so glad I listened to you eventually. You, Sir Knight, are brilliant. Now where’s that baby?’

  ****

  The inevitable meeting with the counsellors had to be held in one of the Palace reception rooms. The six counsellors were but a tiny portion of the gathering. Lawyers, ours and theirs, crowded the big room and the Vienna Police, who’d taken a big interest in our investigations from the start, were interested observers. Like me, if there were a crime anywhere around, they were bound to take an interest and to act, if necessary.

  And I was stimulated.

  The meeting was under the control of Dr. Elmaden, Gerhardt’s judge and now a professor; and he ruled sternly.

  The defence was that there were no rules about the counsellors’ various duties, including their administration of the von Pramberg riches, so how could they have maladministered them? They never went near the word ‘stealing’ in all their verbose arguments. The judge soon cut them off. But they were right. No rules, so how could they break them?

  Then I was asked to speak. Some of the proceedings had been in English but it was obvious that German should prevail. Tessa was close beside me and whispered translations when German was used.

  Now I stood and said, ‘I appreciate that these proceedings are mostly in English for my benefit and I thank you. Ich bin langsam lernen thre Spracht.’ (I am slowly learning your language), and there was laughter and then applause. Tessa looked up at me with love and some surprise. She now translated, from any German spoken, standing beside me, holding my hand. We did a lot of that. Holding hands.

  I said, ‘I think we should keep this simple. The counsellors, by custom and some sort of consent, administered the von Pramberg funds because, frankly, the von Prambergs were glad to have them remove that worry. Ok, so far. But that did not give them the right to use those funds for their own benefit. If you do that, then that’s stealing, under any law in any civilised country. There is no record which the counsellors can produce that gives them that authority. The von Prambergs did not forbid that use because it would be assumed that the counsellors, being occupants of their important positions, would be honest men, beyond reproach. That’s why they’re there. If one is in a position of high trust it follows that one can be trusted.’

  I looked at Tessa. ‘I’m truly sorry that I stirred up this hornet’s nest and I do have a feeling that things should have been left alone. But I’m a Policeman a
nd my colleagues over there would agree that a Policeman cannot ignore a possible crime. He is bound to investigate. And now I think the big ball has started rolling and might be impossible to stop. But I’m going to try to stop it. Excellency, the victims in this crime are Her Royal Highness and her brother….’

  …and you, Knight Barton,’ said Tessa.

  ‘Before we proceed to tomorrow’s hearing, I’d like to talk to the Princess to discuss probable outcomes and consequences. May I have that indulgence, please?’

  The Judge hit the table with his gavel with great force, being very decisive, methinks.

  ‘Yes, Knight Barton, you may!’

  ****

  ‘Do you want them to return as much of the money as they can, and resign, or do you want them to go to prison, darling?’

  We were in our study, seated on a lounge, very close, holding hands, and looking into each other’s eyes. We’d had a quiet dinner and then adjourned for a quiet talk. This wonderful, gentle, sweet, beautiful woman was in turmoil, and I feared that she blamed me. And well she might. I’d been a Policeman for so long that I pursued things out of instinct, when I really didn’t have to. There were other ways, if I’d taken the time to look for them. I had to try to rescue things somehow. David was now disinterested again. Or afraid of what was developing.

  ‘Tessa, I’m sorry I started all this, as I said. Please don’t be disappointed in me?’

  Her look of love would have filled the cathedral with glowing beauty.

  ‘I made the decision, Barton, and I charged ahead, even ahead of you at times. David handed over to us and it’s your money too. I nearly forgot that, and I’m sorry. That was an insult. I could never be angry with you. Never, darling. Now, Inspector, what’s the plan tomorrow?’

  ‘Ask them whether they’re willing to make some restitution and how much. If they resist, protesting their rights or their innocence, let the Police take over. If they show some willingness then we negotiate, with the Judge supervising. They all must resign but let’s think about that. Have you been satisfied with their counselling? Are they wise men? If they go, what do you do for advice? Who administers all the royal accounts? You have bills to be paid, I suppose?’