dijous, 6 d’octubre del 2011

To win a crown

Prince Jakub paced the room in a state of marked agitation.

"This Granville of yours, by what means do you know him? I should not need to remind you, my dear Rittmeister, what is at stake?"

"No your Majesty, I am per..."

"Don't call me that!!! I am at the moment more distant of gaining my fathers crown than any crown prince in history. And it all depends on this ghost of a Granville. Curse your machinations Krefeld!!
If it weren't for you I could have sold my votes long ago. God knows I have received some fine offers recently, to allow me to live nobly in Vienna or Paris."

"If the prince so desires..."

"No,no, I am but in distress to find a way out of this mess. Poland needs and deserves a Polish king, and stay clear of being a pawn in the hands of foreign powers... and who else but a Pole could control the exuberance of our own nobles? But with the way things stand, how am I to convince the nobles to stand behind me. We both know, they only vote for gold!!!"

The princes companion keep quiet. What was there to say, after all the Prince was right. All they could do is wait. Looking out the great windows to the bustling the streets below, he saw a 4 horse coach pull into the prince's palace. it seem visitors were about to arrive.



True enough, the House servant entered shortly afterwards:


" Sire, 2 visitors have presented themselves atthe door, saying you are expecting them?"


The prince shot his compnion an enquiring look. The latter just raised an eyebrow.
"Well who are they?"


" The gentleman is a jew, goes by the name of Mordechai Goldfeder." the lackey mentioned, not even in religiously tolerant Poland has this persecuted people been free of prejudice.
"The lady accompanying him, presented herself as Krystyna Skarbek,  Countess of Granville."


"GRANVILLE!!!" exclaimed the prince, "Countess... so Granville is ..."

"... a Woman" a decidedly feminine voice said from the doorway.
"Your Highness, I hope you will excuse the intrusion, but as I am sure you understand, I have important news to share with you." said the Countess, entering the room completely, closely followed by a very well dressed gentleman, the banker Mordechai Goldfeder.





15 comentaris:

  1. Mmmmmm... as for my little experience at these matters, prominent female characters use to be... er... decisive ;)

    ResponElimina
  2. Especially attractive smart women are a dangerous combination!! As we'll soon see :D

    ResponElimina
  3. the thought had crossed my mind that she might be a Monte-Christorean or had some training from Monte Christo, but would not feel so presumptuous as to do this without the permission of the illustrious ruler of that realm :)

    ResponElimina
  4. No problem, yet or what it may be worth, Monte-Cristo secret (officially non-inexistent) diplomacy and 'actions abroad' generally supports France (except that from the 1st Silesian War to the end of the WAS MC tried to convince Versailles that the real threat was no longer the Habsburg Emperors but the rising power of Prussia; in vain...). Then French Secret du Roy often subcontracts to the MC ''Wives'.

    Who is the charming person appearing as Madame (Mademoiselle?) de Granville?

    Btw a young woman (French by birth) with a name ending in '-ville' is in the service of the Presipality: not as a member of the 'Service' but as a Garde de l'Etrier (uniformed Household Guard moonlighting as Presipapal Assassin...).
    Note that Monte-Cristo shares many features with Tanelorn. While 'currently' (first 3 quarters of the 18th C.) anchored to the Mediterranean shore somewhere between Toulon and Nice, it exists in diverse avatars of the 'Emperor vs Elector' Multiverse *at different times*. 'Nominally' / by default at the year of Fontenoy, but at the end of the WSS in the world of Defiant Galatea (and, seemingly, Herrschaden and Langdouc) and by SYW times in the world of Beerstein, Cavenderia, Pfalz-Kognat-Obersayn and Tippelbruder and Waldreck: thus maybe in the year of Polish elections in 'your' Lace Wars world. Yet always with all the same characters of unchanged age!
    Time and space are very elastic in the 'EvE' Multiverse.

    ResponElimina
  5. PS: according to your description, Rittmeister Krefeld is a kind of Eternal Champion (or is it Dr Who?)?

    ResponElimina
  6. hehe Eternal champion, maybe, more like an avatar screen name that constantly kept turning up in battle of britain flying games, and from there just sort of grew to become a sort of German martial family name, like the Manteuffels or Kleist who seem to turn up in all German wars at some stage.

    As for the delectable Mrs Granville, she as well is actually quite real, just in true Imagi-Nation fashion, a family ancestor of hers played a role here in saving Poland from well the Poles :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krystyna_Skarbek

    (how do you encrust a link here?)

    ResponElimina
  7. But the lovely person on the photo? Taken from a movie?

    More 'seriously', as for encrusting a link, I can't give the information in a comment (not even as text in a blog post: naively I tried!) because it implies html codes that disappear or are refused, or make the text unreadable. So I posted it as images old message on my blog. By clicking on the image you get an enlarged, readable version, but you can more simply download it to read at leisure?
    Hope you'll find it useful,
    Jean-Louis

    ResponElimina
  8. Nice, but who is the cute lady on the photo? Taken from a movie, maybe?

    As for encrusting a link, I simply can't give the process in a comment (not even in a blog post: naively, I tried!) because it implies html codes that disappear, are rejected or make the text unreadable once 'published'.
    Thus I posted it as images in an old post on my blog related to blogging issues (scroll down).
    By clicking on the image you (normally! Blogger is full of fantasy behaviors, these times) get an enlarged, and thus readable, version. Then it would probably be more convenient to download the image and read it a leisure.

    Hoping to be useful,
    cheers,
    Jean-Louis

    ResponElimina
  9. Nice 'rooting' in "RealWorld™" History; then, who is the charming young person on the photo (taken from a movie, maybe?)?

    As for encrusting a directly functional link in a blog post or comment, I can't give you the information in this comment (and neither in a blog post: naively, I tried!) because it implies html codes which once 'published' become invisible, are rejected or make the text unreadable.
    Thus I added it as images to an old post, already dealing with blogging issues, on MC (scroll down).
    By clicking on the image you come to an enlarged, readable version, but it would be more handy to download it and read it at leisure on screen or even to print it?

    Hoping to be helpful,
    best regards,
    Jean-Louis

    PS: sorry for the delay, but for 24h for some reason I could not post comments on blogs...

    ResponElimina
  10. Don't know if this one will pass, but I suspect my previous comment (sent more than once, since it kept disappearing) for some reason ended in your spam box :)

    ResponElimina
  11. Since Blogger seems to longer see my comments as spam... new try:

    Nice 'rooting' in "RealWorld™" History; then, who is the charming young person on the photo (taken from a movie, maybe?)?

    As for encrusting a directly functional link in a blog post or comment, I can't give you the information in this comment (and neither in a blog post: naively, i tried!) because it implies html codes which once 'published' become invisible, are rejected or make the text unreadable.
    Thus I added it as images to an old post, already dealing with blogging issues, on MC (scroll down).
    By clicking on the image you come to an enlarged, readable version, but it would be more handy to download it and read it at leisure on screen or even to print it?

    Hoping to be helpful,
    best regards,
    Jean-Louis

    PS: please delete the previous comment using the trashcan icon. Ticking the 'delete forever' option the deleted comment leaves no trace at all, and thus leaves a 'clean' thread post + comments.

    ResponElimina
  12. I received them, don't know why they don't turn up here:(
    To answer your question, the young lady is Magdalena Mielcarz, and taken from the movie Tara's Bulba(the russian remake from 2008) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWGQw0RgvIo

    ResponElimina
  13. Im no expert. but I believe you just made an excellent point. You certainly fully understand what youre speaking about. and I can truly get behind that.
    Microblading

    ResponElimina