How it would have done so the dear lady did not stop to explain; she rattled on merely because she had become aware that Charlotte was looking at her with a suspiciousness that was rather disconcerting. In her heart of hearts she was a little bit afraid of Charlotte, or of what Charlotte might do. She had not the key to her character; and when the Princess took advantage of a so-called holiday and a change of locality in order to develop new habits and drop certain conventions—especially conventions of dress—her Majesty became uneasy. But just now she was trying for special reasons to drive with a light rein; she wanted Charlotte to enjoy herself, to feel that in this place she could have things more her own way than was customary, and so develop associations which would draw her back to the locality. So far the quite unusual experiment of accompanying the King to his cure had been a success; the people of Bad-as-Bad were delighted at the compliment of receiving Jingalese royalty in the form of a family party; all the aunts and other female relatives of the absent Prince had been most pleasant and attentive; and Charlotte herself had responded to the release accorded her from Court etiquette by becoming wonderfully well and looking really very handsome.

One day, quite unbeknownst to her mother, she had gone right up the inside of the green copper spire of the old Rathhaus, and there seated within its perforated cupola had drunk from a glass of native wine, and thrown the rest of it, glass and all, down the spire—an ancient custom which, as she only heard afterwards, entitled its performer, though of outside extraction, to make her own selection and marry locally.

"So now you have become a native of us," said a chuckling old Margravine, great-aunt to the Prince, when informed of the exploit by one of her grand-nephews who had mischievously lured Charlotte on. "Now you cannot go back!"

For these small princelings were ready enough to make a Jingalese princess feel at home in their midst. But the whole thing, in view of its local color, was rather precipitate and indecorous; and when the Queen heard of it, and of its special application, from the old match-making Margravine with whom she had shared confidences, she was aghast. "Charlotte," she cried, "whatever did you do that for?"

"I did it for fun, mamma."

"But, my dear, it was such a very—forward thing to do!"

Why it was so "forward" Charlotte afterwards found out; for the moment she only thought that she had broken the maternal conventions; things which she did not hold in much regard.

II

Bad-as-Bad had now been in the enjoyment of its Jingalese visitors for over a month. The town prided itself on knowing how to behave to royalty; and every day when the King went down to take the waters, or strolled in the municipal gardens, people pretended not to look at him; and only when he was not actually there did the conductor of the famous band, in the ranks of which operatic first-fiddles kept themselves in practice during their summer holidays—only then did the conductor throw out a delicate compliment, for chance ear-shot, by performing, with variations such as were heard nowhere else, the National Anthem of Jingalo. But each day the musical program was submitted for his Majesty's approval; and if he or the Queen made any suggestion—as it was always hoped they would—then so surely as they approached the kiosk the strains of that particular selection were heard, telling them that Bad-as-Bad was always in attendance upon their wishes, always anxious to give them pleasure, always appreciative of their presence in its midst.

Every day the King paid for his six glasses of water at the fountain-head; every day he bought a buttonhole from the pretty flower-seller in peasant costume who was not herself a peasant at all; every day he bought a Jingalese newspaper at the garden kiosk, and sat under the shade of the trees reading it; and nobody, looking at him, would know that even there he was assiduously followed, ringed round and watched by six detectives, nor could they have any idea how carefully the bona fides of each newly arrived visitor was examined, inquired into, and verified all the way back along the route from place of arrival to place of origin; nay, how thoroughly the luggage of any who were in the least suspicious was searched behind their backs in order to discover whether they had any political opinions likely to prove dangerous to a King taking his holiday.

When the Queen drove out little girls sometimes threw flowers into her carriage, but never often enough to make it a nuisance or to seem mechanical; and when they happened to be very small the Queen would stop and ask them their name and their age and how many brothers and sisters they had; and then a silver coin would pass to the hands of the patient little sentinel. And when the Queen had driven on, a large she-bear or elder sister would come out of the wood and devour it. But everybody would hear about the domestic inquiries and the gift, and would say what a really nice lady the Queen was. That is always the great surprise of the common people when they meet royalty.

But what pleased the inhabitants of Bad-as-Bad most of all was when the Queen came out and sat upon her balcony in the cool of the evening and knitted,—doing it, as someone who watched her through opera-glasses was able to affirm, in the German manner. It was even asserted that she could turn a heel and narrow at the toes without either looking or interrupting the flow of her conversation; and we who have had the cobbling habits of a king of Montenegro held up to us for admiration, must we not think that this also was a most queenly act and an example to all haus-fraus?

Princess Charlotte (the reason for whose being with her parents on this occasion was beginning to leak out) was more elusive in her habits and was seldom on view. She never took the waters, nor sat in the balcony to listen to the band; but kept unheard-of hours—early in the morning, late in the evening—slipping out by back ways and going off on long day expeditions with only one of her ladies. One day she even got lost and spent the night at a hill-chalet. On a lake she had been seen rowing: some said that far out from shore she had actually bathed, but that was not possible; probably she had only fallen in.

The Queen kept what count of her she could, and now and then would counsel moderation, or would try to impose it by getting some of the more elderly gentlemen-in-waiting to join her expeditions. They came home limping and exhausted; in her pursuit of health and vigor Charlotte was ruthless.

"They shouldn't come," she said. "If they do, and find it too much for them, they can sit down at the boundaries and wait for us."

And so she went her own way quite happily, till suddenly there came an upheaval and all semblance of moderation was thrown aside. The cause of this upset was the calculated indiscretion of a Berlin newspaper which had caught Charlotte's eye. There set forth was the story of her ascent of the Rathhaus spire, there also the local custom with its meaning carefully explained, there pointed inquiry as to its particular application if certain rumors were true; and then followed the circumstantial evidence.

The Princess flamed into her mother's presence, paper in hand. "Is this true?" she demanded.

"Dear, dear," said the Queen, having read no further than the preliminary anecdote; "well, you shouldn't do such things!" Then she came upon commentary and surmise, with dates, chapter, and verse. It did not amount to very much, but such facts as there were to go upon were insidiously underlined, and the Prince of Schnapps-Wasser was named.

"Oh, dear," she complained, "I do wish these papers would not be so previous and officious and meddlesome and pretending to know so much."

"But is it true?" demanded Charlotte.

"Is what true?"

"Is it true that you have brought me here to meet him; that we have been waiting for him to come; that some one has sent him my photograph and that he——Oh, it is unbearable!" She broke off and snatched at the offending paper, that she might once more sear her vision with its triangular allusions.

"You oughtn't to read such tittle-tattle!" said her mother. "Why can't you leave the papers alone?"

It was nothing much in itself, the usual coinage of the society journalist intelligently anticipating events. It pointed with sleek pleasantry to the fact that the Prince of Schnapps-Wasser, returning to his inheritance after long exile, would find greeting awaiting him from a royal house which had apparently been very anxious to make his acquaintance. Then followed an account of the visit and prolonged sojourn at Bad-as-Bad of the royal family of Jingalo; the beauty of the Princess was spoken of, her accomplishments, her exploits in climbing and walking; it was rumored that even in South America her photograph had been seen and admired. It was known that the Prince had arrived unexpectedly at his port of departure, and finding a boat on the point of sailing had gone on board. Was it the knowledge that only till a certain date——? The rest we need not set down here. As though it would help her to blot out the record with its attendant circumstances, Princess Charlotte tore the paper into little pieces.

"My dear, don't be so violent!" said the Queen.

"I have been brought here so that he may come and look at me!" cried the Princess, white with wrath. The Queen took up her knitting.

"Nothing of the sort; you were brought here to be with us and to be kept out of mischief."

"Why are we staying a fortnight longer than we intended to?"

"I don't know what you mean by 'we'; I intended to stay till your father had completed his cure. This year it has taken longer."

"It hasn't! He is putting on weight again; only yesterday he told me so. You can't get more cured when that has begun, because it means that you are acclimatized."

"It's no use your talking as if you were a medical authority, my dear, and offering your advice, for we shan't take it."

Charlotte opened her mouth and bottled a breath before she next spoke.

"Who sent him my photograph?"

"Gracious me, child, anybody can get your photograph. Isn't it in all the shop-windows?"

"Not in South America."

"Oh, yes; they are getting quite civilized over there now."

Charlotte struck at a venture.

"You sent it; you know you did! Yes, and then he sent you that thing of himself."

"My dear Charlotte," said the Queen composedly, "you needn't get excited; these little exchanges do sometimes happen quite naturally in the course of correspondence, and I have a great deal of correspondence as you know. Now do forget everything that foolish newspaper has been saying, and look at the thing sensibly. Isn't it my duty to give you every chance of meeting those—those whom it is suitable for you to meet? Are you always going to begin by saying you won't know people?"

"Begin what?" Charlotte shot the question; the Queen turned it aside and went on.

"Now here is a case: this young man who has been away three years among savages—I wonder he wasn't eaten by them—running into all sorts of dangers and doing a lot of foolish brave things that he needn't have done; and then his uncle, the Prince, dying behind his back and everything left to a regency waiting his return. Isn't it quite natural, seeing how things are, that he should be wishing to settle down? Now I am going to be quite frank with you. He has seen your photograph, I know; but I didn't send it to him, and he didn't send me his. We heard that he intended coming to see us—to Jingalo, I mean—and after that I got it; as a matter of fact his aunt, the Margravine, sent it to me; and I, in exchange, sent her yours."

"Ah! so that was why she came to see us directly we got here, and why she looked at me so, and kept asking me so many questions about myself. I couldn't understand it at the time—her being so curious. But you knew, yes, you knew!"

"Well, what if I did?"

"Oh!" cried the Princess, "why, why was I born?"

And then her indignation broke loose, and she became, as the Queen afterwards remarked to her husband when describing the scene, "most unreasonable, and more violent than any one could believe."

After about ten minutes of it her Majesty rose quietly from her chair and rang the bell.

III

A message came to the King that her Majesty wished to see him.

When he arrived in the Queen's boudoir he found his wife sitting in all her accustomed composure; and yet somehow the scene suggested disturbance. Away from her mother at the furthest window stood Charlotte, a charmingly disheveled figure; flushed and bright-eyed she was looking out over the Platz and mopping vehemently at her nose with a handkerchief.

"Don't do that there!" remarked the Queen, "any one might see you."

"Why shouldn't they? They'd only think that I had a cold."

"It isn't the time of the year for colds. Either leave off, or come away from the window."

"There, you see!" cried Charlotte, stung to fresh exasperation, "I can't even stand where I like now!"

"What is the matter?" inquired the King.

"Tell your father what you have been saying," said the Queen, finding it better that the culprit herself should explain.

"I don't know what I've been saying."

"I should think not; it didn't sound like it. Now that you've got both parents to listen to you, talk to them and tell them your mind."

This threw Charlotte into a fresh paroxysm. "Oh, why did I ever have parents?" she cried.

"Yes, that appears to be the trouble," said the Queen. "John, this is a revolting daughter. I've heard of them, and now I've got the thing brought home to me. Look at her!"

"What are you revolting about, my dear?" inquired the King kindly.

"Everything!" exclaimed Charlotte.

"Quite true," said the Queen, "everything."

"Well, begin at the beginning." And Charlotte screwed herself up to speak.

"I came to talk to mamma about something," she said, "something that mattered very much. I suppose you know about it too."

The Queen gave her husband an informing look.

"And what do you think she did?" Charlotte continued. "First she told me not to be foolish; and after that, to everything I said she went on—just as if she didn't hear me—knitting, knitting!"

"She says," interrupted the Queen, "that she is not going to marry anybody, and particularly not the Prince, because she hates him. I say how can she know when she hasn't seen him."

"I won't marry him!" cried Charlotte, "I've seen his photograph."

"Yes, and you liked it," said her mother. This did not improve matters.

"But nobody is forcing you to marry him," said the King. "I don't know why it has even been mentioned." And, seeking a clue, he cast a troubled glance at the Queen.

"It's in all the papers!" retorted Charlotte, indulging in poetic license. "And you know it! Yes, he is coming here to look at me, to see if he likes me, and to see if I can pretend to like him. But I won't be looked at, it's an indignity I won't stand. I'll not even see him!"

"But why ever not?" exclaimed her father.

Charlotte wriggled with impatience.

"Oh, can't you see? Supposing he comes and does look at me; and then goes away without—without caring!—That's what you are asking me to put up with. For me to know, and for him to know, and for him to know that I know! How would you like it yourself?"

"I tell her she is very ridiculous," said the Queen. "A Princess can't marry a mushroom. Does she want to fall in love with her eyes shut. Something has to be done beforehand, or we should never be anywhere——"

"I don't want to be anywhere," said the Princess.

"Outside a lunatic asylum," said her mother, completing the sentence.

"My dear child," put in the King, "don't you see that nothing is really settled—and will not be until you agree to it?"

"Then why did you ever tell him anything about it? Why couldn't we have just met? It's this picking of us out beforehand behind our backs, and then telling us of it; that's what I can't stand!"

"My dear, nobody is forcing you," repeated the King persuasively.

"Then I won't see him."

"I tell her she must," remarked the Queen in a tone of comfortable finality.

"Mamma, will you stop knitting!" cried Charlotte. "You treat me as if I were an insect!"

"You have got the brains of one," retorted her mother. "John, will you please speak to her? Perhaps you can understand what it all means; I can't. She has been talking Greek to me—something or other about the Trojans."

"Yes; the Trojan women," corrected Charlotte.

"She says she's like one of them!"

"So I am."

"I don't know which one, you mentioned so many."

"All of them. Yes, papa, they had to go and live with foreigners—men they had never seen."

"Don't say 'live with'; it's an objectionable term."

"Die with them, then: some did! One of them killed a king in his bath; at least his wife did, but it's all the same."

"Yes; she began quoting some verses to me about that bath affair," said the Queen. "And I must say they didn't sound to me quite decent."

Charlotte was quite ready to repeat it.

"Oh, don't quote poetry to me!" begged the King. "I don't understand it."

"And I try not to," said the Queen. So Charlotte's quotation was ruled out of the discussion.

"Don't you think, my dear," persuaded her father, "that meeting him here, as it just so happens, will seem sufficiently accidental?"

"Not after we've waited for him all this time; not after I climbed up that spire and threw my cap at him without knowing it," said the Princess. "Oh, you don't know what that paper has been saying!" And she pointed to the bits.

The King stooped and began gathering them up.

"It's all nonsense, John," said the Queen. "Don't indulge her by paying any attention."

And at that renewed proof of her mother's imperviousness of mind Princess Charlotte ran out of the room.

"Leave her alone!" remarked the Queen, sure of her own sagacity, "she'll calm down. My belief is that she really likes him. I saw her looking at his photograph; it wasn't only once, either."

IV

Three days later the King and Queen of Jingalo were at home by special appointment to receive a call of ceremony. The streets of Bad-as-Bad were hung with flags—here and there of the two nationalities, side by side, their corners (delicate symbol!) tied together by a knot of white ribbon.

Grooms of the Chamber had donned full Court dress for the occasion, and a complete staff of servants, equerries, attaches, and ministers in attendance lined the route from the portico of the converted hotel which served as the King's villa to the large private apartment where the actual meeting took place.

"His Royal Highness, Grand Duke and Hereditary Prince of Schnapps-Wasser," pronounced the Master of Ceremonies in that awestruck tone which is exclusively reserved for the introduction of crowned heads or territorial princes; and a youthful giant, six feet four in height, entered the room, struck his heels together with military precision, and bowed low.

He wore his own clothes—one of his own uniforms, that is to say—and the King of Jingalo wore one of his, for they had not hitherto exchanged regiments in token of peace and amity—a matter to be put right on a future occasion.

The Prince wore sky-blue trimmed with sable, and brightened with silver facings; tunic and trousers of an extremely tight fit set off a muscular frame. From his shoulders, presumably in case of accident, hung an extra tunic; but the other extra did not show. Boots reaching to the thighs and a head-dress of almost equal height borne upon the arm, completed the splendor of his array. Bowing his way in, he had so martial an air that the Queen's heart was quite won by it, and she regretted that Charlotte, belated in her attendance, had not been there to see.

The Prince uttered with correctness, though in a rather heavy German accent, the formula of royal greeting; and throughout the interview continued to speak in Jingalese. As soon as the doors were closed—leaving only royalty, he dropped into homelier speech. "I hope the cure has done you no harm," he said, "that it has not too greatly diverted your digestion; some people are much upset by it."

The King and Queen hastened to reassure him. Bad-as-Bad, its air, its waters, and its society had treated them in the handsomest way possible. "We are quite sorry," said the Queen, "that so soon we shall have to leave."

The Prince glanced round before asking abruptly: "And the Princess—she is still here?"

"She will be here presently," answered the Queen, "I am expecting her any moment. She goes on long walks," she added, by way of explanation.

"Ah, good!" commented the Prince.

Many minutes went by, conversation alternately flowed and halted. They were all conscious of an impediment, for still the Princess did not appear; and at last her Majesty was impelled to send one of her ladies to make inquiry. "She takes such very long walks," explained the Queen once more.

"Ah, good, very good indeed," remarked the Prince in a spirit of acceptance.

And then, after a little more waiting, the lady came back to say that the Princess could not be found; she and one of her ladies had gone out together.

"How very forgetful of her!" exclaimed the Queen.

Just then, very discreetly, but with a look full of meaning, a private secretary came and put a telegram into the King's hand. Excusing himself to the Prince he opened it; it was postmarked from the station office at Schnapps, and it read thus—

"I have gone home. Charlotte."

It was no use; the surprise of it was too much for him. "She has run off!" he ejaculated; the compromising phrase had slipped out before he was aware.

"Who?" cried his wife, though knowing quite well.

"Charlotte; she has gone home."

Husband and wife stared at each other mute and amazed; while the Prince sat trying with amiable look to excuse himself for being there.

Then the Queen did her best to cover matters; but it was not a great success. "I knew that she wanted to get home," she murmured. "And she is so impulsive; sometimes there is no holding her at all."

"I must apologize," said the King. "This is really quite unaccountable."

The Prince's eye flashed with a curious light; he smiled good-humoredly.

"I think it is very interesting," said he. "When will it be allowed that I shall see her?"



CHAPTER XIII

A PROMISSORY NOTE



I

On their return to Jingalo the Princess heard from her parents how badly she had behaved.

"But I had to do it!" she protested. "After what that paper had said, and all the other things, how else could I show that I hadn't come on purpose?"

"And pray, do you always mean running away from him?" inquired the Queen.

"I shan't go to Bad-as-Bad again, I know that."

"But if he comes here."

"Why, are you going to ask him?"

"He has asked himself," said her father.

"Oh!" This came as a surprise.

"But, of course," he continued, "if you mean to go on being rude to him, it wouldn't do."

"I have never been rude to him!" protested Charlotte. "I only refused to be trapped into meeting him. I shouldn't have minded if it had just been by accident; but it wasn't."

"I'm afraid it can never be by accident now," replied her father. "But you needn't be here when he arrives, or when he goes; though in between whiles, of course, you would have to meet him. And then—well, if you wanted to see more of each other—he might come again."

Charlotte showed her distaste for any temporizing of that sort. "The only difference I can see," she remarked, "is that first you were for offering me to him openly and now I'm to be a sandwich."

"You are not to be anything you don't like, my dear," said her father with gentleness. "But you know, child, we have not the whole world to choose from; being kings and queens and princesses doesn't make life a fairy tale."

"But it does, when we have to end by marrying princes. That's the bother of it."

"Well, I am trying to make it easier for you. Oh, I admit the drawbacks; but why make them out worse than they are?"

Charlotte's moods always softened under her father's cajolery; not that she was more fond of him than of her mother; but these two had more ground for mutual sympathy and understanding; and pity for his vaguely harassed countenance was never far absent from her heart.

"I am having just now," the King went on, "a very trying and disturbing time—in ways that I don't want to talk about. Do try, child, not to add to my anxieties."

Charlotte, feeling compunction working within her, thought hard for a while. "Before he comes——" she said, and stopped. "Papa, when does he come?"

"Not till after the winter session has opened—perhaps about Christmas."

"Well, before he comes, then, I want to go away quite by myself for three weeks or a fortnight, and then—I'll think about it. If, when the time comes, you want me to see him I will, and I promise not to be rude to him. But he shan't think that I have been waiting for him, or that I want to have anything to do with him; I shall make that quite plain."

"Then I do hope that you know what not being rude means," put in the Queen; "for I must say that doesn't sound like it."

"Oh, I will provide a safe margin," replied Charlotte. "He shall have nothing to complain of. If I do see him I will be as nice to him as ever I can; much nicer than you have been to me!"

"Now, my dear, don't begin scuffling again!" said her father deprecatingly. "Very well; that's settled then."

"And you will give me that fortnight?"

"Longer, my dear, if you wish."

"No," said the Queen, "a fortnight is quite enough, if she means to spend it pretending to be a Trojan woman."

"If I stay away longer than a fortnight," said Charlotte, "you can send and fetch me." Then she turned to her father. "I am very sorry, papa, ever to have to pain you: but you don't know how dreadful it feels if one isn't allowed to be oneself."

"Oh, don't I?" exclaimed his Majesty. "My dear, if you knew what being a king was really like—but there, we won't talk politics now! By the way, as you came back before we did, do you happen to know what has become of Max?"

"I haven't seen him," said Charlotte with a certain air of discretion; "but I had a line from him in answer to one I wrote on my arrival: and he does seem to have been doing something at last."

"What has he been doing?"

"Getting his head broken."

"Good gracious!" exclaimed the Queen. "However did he come to do that?"

"He says he was working among the strikers and got hit. Nobody knows about it, and he doesn't want it known. He writes that he is being very well looked after at some private nursing place."

"Did he give you the address?" inquired her Majesty suspiciously.

"No; he said he would be home in a day or two, and then we might all come and see him."

"So this is what goes on while I am away!" complained the Queen, as though her being at home might have prevented it. "And I wonder how it was we didn't hear the news. To think of poor Max getting hit like that and the papers saying nothing about it!"

II

Later in the day the King heard more of the matter from the Comptroller-General. It had not been kept out of the papers quite as completely as it should have been. There were rumors, allusions; but none of the leading dailies had said anything.

"I gather, sir," said the General, "that the Prince has been preparing himself very thoroughly for the work of the coming Commission, making personal investigations, mixing daily with the people in the very poorest districts. Of course it was the duty of the detective service to know of it and to take what steps they could to insure his safety. I am told that what actually happened was that on one occasion his Royal Highness went to the aid of the police, hard pressed by a gang of rioters; and he was injured in the general melee. It all took place in a moment and of course no one had any idea that he would involve himself in it. When he was picked up by the detectives he gave a certain address." Here the Comptroller assumed an air of the utmost discretion. "To that address he was taken; and there I believe, sir, still remains."

"Dear, dear," said the King, "very distressing, very unfortunate. I had hoped all that was over."

"There is no reason, sir, to doubt that he has been properly looked after; certificated nurses have been in attendance, and at no time was there any danger."

"And how much of this has got into the papers?"

"Nothing, sir, as to the origin of the affair; but there have been some interrogations as to his Highness's present whereabouts, and an idea is abroad that he is not where the Court circular continues to say he is. Of course, when such rumors creep out there are also undesirable suggestions, which it would be well to put a stop to as soon as possible. I am glad to hear from your Majesty that the Prince intends coming back into residence. I have been in communication with his secretary, but I have not that gentleman's confidence and he has told me nothing."

"Well," said the King, "at all events the cause of it all—however much the result of indiscretion—was quite reputable."

"Oh, quite."

"Commendable even."

"I am told that his Highness showed great dash and determination." Yet whatever he had been told, there was embarrassment in the General's manner.

"Very well, then," said the King, "if there is any more tittle-tattle—in the press, I mean—you might let the facts be known; surely they ought to strike the popular imagination; and I'm sure the police need all the support we can give them just now."

The General hesitated.

"Would not that tend somewhat to prejudice his Highness's position as an impartial head of the Commission? Talking to the workers themselves, before the sittings have yet begun, has a certain air of parti pris. Some of the Commission, I fear, would not like it."

"To tell the truth," said the King, "I very much doubt whether the Prince will serve upon that Commission at all. He will probably be called elsewhere."

The Comptroller seemed considerably relieved. "Ah, that, of course, entirely removes the difficulty. I am afraid, sir, things are in a very disturbed state; so many people with new ideas are airing them just now; sympathy is being shown for criminals, and respect for government is not increasing. I know that the Prime Minister is getting very anxious; he hopes that to-morrow he may see your Majesty."

The King did not welcome the news; during the past few months he had quite lost any remnant of liking that he might once have had for the head of his Government. But when the Prime Minister arrived they exchanged the usual compliments and each was glad to see the other looking so well after change of air and occupation. In the Prime Minister's case, however, that was already over; politicians were in harness again to their respective departments, and on reopening his portfolio he had found a pack of troubles awaiting him.

The nuisance of Jingalese politics was this, that the political situation never would keep itself within the bounds of the ministerial program; and to-day not only had certain voting interests become obstreperous, but other interests which had not the vote were obstreperous also. In these last few months, while its rulers had been taking their well-earned rest, Jingalo had remained agog, obstinately progressive on foolish lines of its own; nothing any longer seemed content to stay as it had been: movement had become a craze.

Under his monarch's eye the Prime Minister thumbed his notes. He spoke of falling revenue, stagnation of trade, strikes, and the increase of violence. Police had actually been killed and the riot leaders were on trial. Presently he came to lesser matters.

"Sedition," said he, passing them in review, "is now openly preached every week in the Women's War Cry."

"Why do you not suppress it?" inquired the King.

"It is difficult to do that, sir, without disturbing trade. The paper is highly offensive and seditious; but it has an enormous advertising interest at its back, and so we don't like to touch it. When shop-looting began three years ago as a form of political propaganda it was noticed that those firms which advertised in the Women's War Cry escaped the attentions of the rioters. Immediately the rush to advertise in its pages became tremendous—especially as further loots were then threatening. It has now some forty pages of advertisement and can afford in consequence to retain upon its staff the best journalists and critical writers of the day. Its War Cry, printed separately, inserted as a loose supplement, and with the statement 'given gratis' stamped across it in red ink, occupies a comparatively small portion of its space; all the rest is advertisement and high-class journalism. The circulation has gone up by leaps and bounds, and the profits are very considerable. If we prosecuted we might only find that in law the two portions were wholly distinct and independent of each other (I am told that they have even different printers), and the failure of the Crown's case would be a blow to the prestige of the Government; while if we succeeded altogether in suppressing it we should be more unpopular with the great middle-class trade interests than we are already."

"Why should you try to be popular?" inquired the King.

"A Government cannot exist upon air," remarked the Prime Minister; "and, after all, we do endeavor to deal fairly by all the interests which go to make up the prosperity of the country."

"You mean the trade prosperity?"

The Prime Minister did; but he did not like it to be stated thus baldly. "I was only wondering," went on the King, "what price you were prepared to pay for it. We must tolerate sedition, it seems; must we also, in the same interest, encourage disease?"

"I fear that I do not follow your Majesty's argument."

"I was merely recalling what the Prince told me for a fact just before I went abroad. He had been informed of it by a social worker who gave him chapter and verse. Two years ago the medical profession published a book exposing all the fraudulent patents and quack medicines which occupy so large a space in the advertising columns of our newspapers. The book was put authoritatively upon the market, and, as I understand, was advertised in all the leading papers. When the paid-for advertisements terminated not a single paper would renew the contract. The holders of those quack medicines and patents had found means to shut down (so far as the advertising of it was concerned) a scientific work which threatened to diminish their profits. That is why I ask what price we are prepared to pay for the protection of trade interests."

"I should like to be assured of the truth of that statement, with all respect to your Majesty, before I pass any comment."

"You can write to the College of Medicine if you really wish for the facts. I myself made very much the same query, and was shown as proof a letter from its president to one of the medical journals."

But even this did not induce the Prime Minister to regard the matter very seriously. "After all, sir," said he, "viewed in a certain light it is only a method of trade competition; for when the sales of patent medicines decrease no doubt the doctors begin to profit."

"The State has thought it worth while," said the King, "to give to the medical profession a certificated monopoly. Is it outside its province to warn the public against charlatans?"

"Is not charlatans an extreme term? I believe, sir, that many of these patents are quite excellent and in their first effects a stimulant to health; and in these days when 'suggestion' and 'faith-healing' are so much talked of it is an arguable proposition that those drugs which give to mind and body a certain preliminary incentive afford the best leverage for faith to work on. Of course there are a great many matters which need control, supervision, and reform; vested interests do tend to create abuses; but I must remind your Majesty that in the pushing of its reforms the Government has not been quite a free agent. In many respects we have been greatly hindered; that is still the crux of the political situation."

"Ah, yes," said the King, "you do well to remind me. You are, I take it, now engaged in educating the country; the terms of your proposals are before it. May I ask whether your anticipations of popular support have proved correct?"

"We find no reason to alter our opinion as to the necessary solution."

"Or as to your determination to proceed with it?"

The Prime Minister was very urbane. "Your Majesty has been good enough to indicate a date when all difficulties will be removed."

It was a sufficient statement of what was in store.

"Thank you," said the King, "I did wish to know. Have you done well at the by-elections?"

"Beyond the inevitable tear-and-wear due to our period of office we have nothing to complain of."

"I have been longer in office than you," said the King, smiling rather sadly, "and I suppose that in my case the inevitable wear-and-tear has been proportionately greater. You will make allowances, therefore, if I have been slow in arriving at my conclusion. After the date we agreed upon I think you will have no ground for complaint."

"I hope your Majesty has never regarded as a complaint the advice which I have felt bound to offer."

"There is a complaint somewhere," said the King; "perhaps a constitutional one. All I wanted to avoid was quack remedies."

He was rather pleased with himself at thus rounding off the discussion: for while reiterating his promise he had indicated that his own opinion was quite as unchanged as that of his ministers. And so with a little time still left in which to turn round he bethought him of the duty which lay on him to set his house in order against future events. And then it struck him how very important it was that Max should now "settle down" and eliminate for good and all certain elements from his life. Yes, it had become quite necessary that Max should marry.

III

Max was back again in his proper quarters, and the Queen had been to pay him a visit of motherly condolence. She, too, was set upon eliminating from his life those things which ought not to be in it; and finding him still rather feeble from the blow that had fallen on him, and with a head still bandaged, she thought it a seasonable opportunity to press him in the way he should go. But she was not one of those who have any taste for probing into young men's lives; she had an instinctive feeling that such a line of ethical exploration lay entirely beyond her; and so when she approached the subject her touch was only upon the surface.

"Max, my dear," she said fondly, "I do wish you would marry."

Max smiled at her with filial indulgence, and then, perceiving that there might be entertainment in a conversation well packed with double meanings, he fell in with her suggestion.

"I wish I could," he said, "but there are difficulties that you don't understand."

"Oh, yes, I think I do," she answered. "Of course with us there are always difficulties. The choice is so limited."

"I should rather incline to say that it is fixed."

"You mean just to the two I told you of? But you wouldn't have either of them."

"Perhaps I ought to say that I am fixed, then; I can't very well see myself changing."

"Oh, no, Max, no! Don't say that!" cried his mother, alarmed. "It is so very important that you should marry. And people are beginning to expect it."

"Yes, but as I say, there are difficulties—religious ones."

This was strange news for the Queen. Had Max a conscience then? It was a portent for which she had not been prepared.

"Of course," she said, "I don't want to ask questions."

"Perhaps you had better not."

"But I do want you to settle."

"I am settled," said Max.

It was dreadful to hear him say so, and a horrible idea that he had contracted a secret marriage with that foreign woman crossed her mind. Was this the difficulty that she did not understand? She grew timorous, afraid that he was going to tell her something—set before her some moral problem which she could not possibly solve. What if he were trying to entrap her, to lure her into taking sides with him over something no King or Government could countenance? From such a danger as that all her conventional femininity gathered itself in a panic-stricken bundle and fled.

"Max, dear," she said, "I would much rather you didn't tell me."

"I quite agree," he replied.

"But——" She paused, searching her mind for succor; and then, having found it, "Why not see the Archbishop about it?" she urged; "I am sure he could remove all your difficulties."

Max almost jumped out of his skin before he perceived how guileless had been his mother's remark. But the opportunity was certainly not to be missed.

"I should be delighted to see him," he said. "Indeed, I think he more than any one might solve my difficulty."

"Then you shall!" cried his mother, and fondly believed that, without becoming entangled herself she had wrought a good work and provided means to a solution. The Archbishop would, of course, be able to solve for him any difficulties of conscience, and to put such things as—well, anything he might have done in the past—in its right and proper place.

Her Majesty had a great belief in archbishops. At the hands of one she had been confirmed, it had taken two of them to marry her, and by one or another each of her four children had been well and truly baptized. They had also preached sermons of eloquent optimism over the two who had so prematurely died. And since she regarded all that they had done for her as eminently successful in result, they stood out in her world as the most efficient aids to the spiritual etceteras of life; and if any moral difficulty dimmed for a moment the clear horizon of her soul she would turn to the nearest archbishop for advice and encouragement.

And so the Archbishop came to see Prince Max in his convalescence, and sat by his side and talked to him, and tried by various diplomatic shifts to draw his confidence in the salutary direction desired by her Majesty; for he and the Queen had held conversation together on the matter. And Max, lying back at ease upon his cushions, and pretending to be a little further from complete recovery than he really was, examined that face of stern ecclesiastical mold, and seeking therein for some likeness to his beloved found none.

Nevertheless he listened respectfully without protest to the voice of the Church, when at last the Archbishop started to deliver his charge: he heard how necessary it was for the nation that those who were its rulers should set before it an example of regular family life, and how inexpedient it was for that example to be too long delayed; he heard of duty as though it came by inheritance to the accompaniment of a position and a title, and of many other things that he had heard tell of before and profoundly disagreed with; but for once he was not argumentative. He let the Church speak to him and advise him to do the thing he was longing to do, and to leave that life which (without a word said on the matter) he was known to have been leading in the past. And when the Archbishop had quite done and taken his departure, then Max rose up from his bed of sickness and went down to Sister Jenifer and, presenting to her gaze a broken and a contrite head and a rather pallid countenance, spoke as follows: "I have been having a talk with your father, O Beloved, and he tells me that I ought to marry you."

IV

On the next day Max received a visit from his father.

"Well," said the King, wishing to bestow commendation on a wound honorably come by, "you have been on the side of law and order for once at any rate."

"I?" cried Max.

"I hear that you assisted the police."

"On the contrary," said Max, "I went to rescue a poor youth from their clutches."

"Good gracious me!" cried the King, horror-struck.

"Oh, they were quite right to arrest him, but having arrested him, they proceeded to assault him; and when I interfered they assaulted me. And had I not been the person I am, with detectives at my heels to vouch for me, I should have been doing a fortnight hard for interfering with the police in the execution of their duty."

"But I heard it was a beer-bottle thrown by one of the rioters!"

"Oh, no; a truncheon,—having I believe your image and superscription stamped somewhere upon it. Your own mark, sir." And Max pointed to the scar upon his head. "When I, in turn, have to wear the crown its rim will probably rest on that very spot. What a coincidence that will be!"

"Max, this is really too bad of you!" said his father.

"It comes of trying to mix with the people."

"Well, you shouldn't; for we can't do it."

"Not without paying the price. I have, and it was worth it."

"What good has it done you?"

"Can you not see how it has steadied me? You behold here a reformed character who is now only waiting for his father's blessing to lead a good and holy life ever after. Oh, yes, I know what you have come about, sir; my mother has been at me, the Archbishop has been at me,—you have all of you been at me one time or another; and so far as I am concerned, if we can only agree upon who the lady is to be, I am ready to marry her to-morrow."

Then, perceiving a terror in his father's eye (for the Queen had breathed in his ear some word of her apprehensions), Max, divining its cause, spoke to reassure him. "No," said he, "it is not the Countess; she had thrown me over, and is now only a second mother to me. This was largely of her mending." He again pointed to the scar. "Can such things be done, you wonder, in a second establishment? Well, remember it is now only a mausoleum. For three weeks I have lain there like a mummy with my head swathed in bandages."

"Max, I wish you would not talk like that," said the King. "I wanted to speak seriously to you."

"And I to you," answered Max. "But when I start I shall only shock you more."

"Well, we had better get it over, then. Say the most serious thing you have to say, and be done with it!"

Then Prince Max drew a bold breath. "Conditionally upon your consent, sir"—he began—"(I myself regret the condition, but on that point the lady is adamant)—I say all this in order to let the whole case be stated before giving you the necessary shock——"

"Oh, go on!" groaned the King.

"Conditionally, then, I am already engaged to be married."

The King's mind went vacuously all round the Courts of Europe, and returned to him again empty.

"Whom to?" he inquired.

Max made his announcement with stately formality.

"The lady who honors me with her affection is the daughter of our Primate Archbishop."

"Good Heavens!" cried the King. "Does he know of it?"

"No more than the babe unborn; two days ago he sat there telling me it was my duty to marry; and I thinking of his daughter all the time."

"Impossible!" exclaimed the King.

"I knew you would say that,—so did she. That I believe is why she gave me her consent."

"Then she does not really——"

"Love me? Very much, I believe. But her life is a strange mingling of sincerity and self-sacrifice; and it will in some strange way give her almost as much joy to have owned that her heart is utterly mine, and then to be irrevocably parted, as it would to share all the splendor of my fortune as heir to a throne."

"You know, Max, that it is quite impossible."

"Yes; by all the conventions of the last three hundred years, so it is. That is why I trust that you will rise to the occasion, sir, and do what is not expected of you. To allow your son and heir to marry the daughter of the great political antagonist of your present Prime Minister in itself creates an almost impossible situation—for party politics, I mean. But as party politics have already created an almost impossible situation for monarchy, the best thing to do is to have a return hit at party politics. I believe that the monarchy will survive."

"No, no, Max," said the King, "this won't do."

"You know that it would greatly upset the Prime Minister."

"I have other ways of doing that," said the King.

"Without upsetting yourself?"

This gave his Majesty a little start. "It depends what you mean by upsetting; perhaps it would upset you much more. But there, we won't talk about that!" For this was danger-point, and having touched it, he hurried cautiously away from it. Then he returned to the original charge: "Whatever put the idea into your head?"

"A vision of beauty that I had not believed to be possible."

"Is she so very beautiful, then?"

"You have seen her, sir, and you have not remembered her. I did not mean that sort of beauty."

"Ah, then, you are really in love."

"Ludicrously," confessed Max.

"My dear boy, I am very sorry for you."

"Oh, you need not be, sir; I am quite sure of myself at last; and by refusing to marry anybody else I have only to wait and you will have to yield to my request."

"You may have to wait a long time," began the King, and then he stopped; for looking into the future he saw Max in a new light, that same fierce light which had beaten upon himself for the last twenty-five years, preventing him from doing so many things he had wished to do. It would prevent Max too.

"But I want your consent now, father," said the young man; and there was something of real affection in his voice.

"Why can't you wait till I am dead?"

"That would be selfish of me. Do you not want to see me happy first?"

But to that the King only shook his head.

"It won't do, Max, it won't do. The Archbishop wouldn't like it either," he went on, trying to get back to the political aspect again. "It would be terribly damaging to him. With a connection like that, leadership of his party would become impossible."

"Have we to consider the political ambitions of an archbishop?"

"You would have to get his consent."

"I don't think so. All she bargained for was yours. I told her I would get it; and she did not believe me."

"You make me wish that I were altogether out of the way."

"Quite unnecessary, I'm sure."

"Ah, but if you were in my position then you'd see—then you'd understand. You couldn't do it; you simply couldn't do it."

The King was now saying what he really believed, and at the sound of his own voice telling him he realized that all he had to do was to temporize and time would bring its own solution. If Max were King he could no more do this thing than he could fly. Why, then, should he trouble himself?

To cover his change of ground he continued the argument, and on every point allowed Max to beat him (he could not probably have prevented it, but that was the way he put it to himself), and finally, when he felt that he could in decency throw up the sponge, he let Max have his way—or the way to it, which was the same thing.

"Well," he said, "I can't give you my consent all at once. I must have time to turn round and think about it; you must have time too. But if——" here he paused and did a short sum of mental arithmetic. "Yes," he went on, "if in two months from now you find me still upon the throne—and I'm sure I don't know that you will with the way things are going and all the worry I've had—but if you do, and are still of the same mind about it, then you may come to me and I will give you my consent."

A quiet, rapturous smile passed over the face of Max. "May I have that in writing, sir?" he said.

The King was rather taken aback, and a little affronted. "Do you doubt my word?" he demanded.

"Not in the least, but it is your consent I have to get. You might have a stroke, or lose your memory; you might even die, and there should I be left stranded. My love is so great that I can let it run no risks. And therefore, sir, if you will be so good, a promissory note to take effect in two months' time."

"You won't tell your mother?" said the King, halting, pen in hand.

Max shook his head sagely. "Nobody shall know," said he. "No filter could contain such news as this." He took the precious document from the King's hand, folded it, and put it away.

"By the way, sir," he said, "in a week or two I shall be sending you my book."

"I am afraid it is going to shock people," said his father.

"Not nearly so much as this." Max touched his breast pocket and smiled. "I will confess now, sir, that I really had hardly a hope: if I said so just now, I lied. And if a son may ever tell his father that he is proud of him, let that pleasure to-day be mine."

They parted on the best of terms. "I wonder," thought the King to himself, "whether he will be quite so pleased and proud two months hence."

His countenance saddened, and he sighed. "Poor boy," he said. He was very fond of Max.



CHAPTER XIV

HEADS OR TAILS



I

It is no use pretending that all history is equally interesting, even though the facts which it contains are necessary for an understanding of what follows. And I am well aware that much of this history so far has been very dull. We have been exploring interiors, moldy institutions, cast-iron conventions, and one poor human mind,—with a tap on the back of its head as an incentive—wriggling to find a way out. But from this point on you see him wriggling no more; the slow wave of his resolve has crept to its crest and now breaks into foam.

A month has now passed by; and four weeks hence the enamored Max will be coming for his answer—Max asking for the impossible thing. Like the man who set fire to the tail of his night-shirt in order to stop the hiccoughs, so now John of Jingalo had at his heels that terror of his own planting driving him on. Perhaps nothing else would have given him the courage.

The day for the last Council meeting had arrived, the last before the closing of that long session of Parliament which, beginning in February, had run on at intervals into November. Then only a brief month, and the winter session with the new Government program would open.

It was to this Council that the Cabinet's latest scheme for squeezing the Bishops out of the Constitution was to be presented; and for that to be possible, since he was so great a stickler for constitutional propriety, the King's consent had been necessary. A few days before, therefore, the Prime Minister had once more formally submitted the question; and the King had given his leave. "Produce what you like, Mr. Premier; I will no longer stand in your way."

The brief autumn session was closing with a clangor of agitation which had not been heard in Jingalo for half a century at least. Everybody outside the machinery of party was profoundly dissatisfied with the parliamentary system and with all its doings and undoings; and this general dissatisfaction was being quaintly expressed by a refusal to let Parliament rise. The Women Chartists were battering at its closed doors; and from peep-holes and other points of vantage within, smiling and indifferent legislators saw those bruised bodies, those strangely obsessed minds, those indomitable spirits carried off to magisterial lack of judgment and to prison.

With a good deal more concern they saw strikes breaking out in their own constituencies, and riot becoming the normal accompaniment of the industrial demand for better conditions. Three strike leaders were in prison under sentence of death for having killed by purposeful accident a few over-zealous policemen; and from great working centers over a hundred miles away thousands of men were marching to demand remittance of the death penalty.

The Government was, in consequence, in a great hurry to get the session closed. It was an undignified scramble of the red-tape worms of various departments to be well out of the way before those slow, heavily shod feet of labor arrived upon the scene. At every town they came to they stopped, made inflammatory speeches, gathered funds and adherents, and then, a swelled body of discontent, marched stolidly on toward the capital; and this not from one point alone but from half-a-dozen at once. If there was not to be conflict between the police and these converging forces, appeasement of some sort must be devised, or official vacuum must be there to meet them.

And behind all this was the ministerial fear that, if they were not quick about it, it would be impossible to close Parliament with due ceremony. The Lord High Functionary had put it bluntly to the Prime Minister. "If those men get here we can't have out the piebald ponies and the state coach; they wouldn't stand it."

And as the piebald ponies and the state coach were necessary for the prestige of the Government and for proof that the King and his ministers were working amicably together, therefore the red-tape worms were all wriggling their level best under pressure from above, and in the small hours every morning millions of public money were being voted into the hands of the Government by an obedient majority of sleepy legislators, bound by party loyalty neither to criticise nor to control.

It was in the midst of affairs thus disarranged that on a morning three days before the rising of Parliament the Royal Council met, and awaited with official calm the advent of its titular head.

Since his outbreak of a few months ago the King had once more become amenable to that deferential guidance which was his due; and now word had gone round that all further opposition was to be withdrawn, and the Ministry to have its way.

And so the piece de resistance is at last in full brew and we see the twenty cooks of the national broth waiting without any trepidation of spirit for the royal flavoring to arrive. And they talk among themselves in carefully modulated tones; for it is not etiquette, when the doors are thrown open to the royal presence, that the King should hear conversation going on.

The Prime Minister enters a little later than the rest, carrying his brief, and moves to his place near the head of the board through a circle of congratulatory looks and smiles. For all know that in this long bout with titular kingship, obstinate for the preservation of its rights, the representative of Cabinet control has won, and that a new and very comfortable stage in the subservience of monarchy to ministerial ends has been attained.

And how quietly this important little bit of constitutional revolution has been carried through!—without any passing of laws or petition of rights, merely by internal pressure judiciously applied. And Jingalo, that well-represented State governed by the popular will, knows nothing of what has been done; like a body in absolute health it is unconscious of the working of those vital functions so necessary for its constitutional development. Oh, admirable popular will! in searching for your whereabouts and to come into touch with you, old monarchy has had yet another tumble—and at the right and preconcerted time will reach the ground without any outward revolution at all.

If these or suchlike thoughts were in the mind of the Cabinet, just then they were diverted by the sound of opening doors; and there entered, not the King himself, but a Court functionary in full dress attended by two others, and bearing before him on a crimson cushion a sealed document.

A few eyebrows went up; what revival of old forms was this? The functionary advanced and with a low bow presented the document not to the Prime Minister, but to the Lord President of the Council. "By his Majesty's gracious command," said he, "a message from his Majesty the King to his faithful people."

Then, with another bow, the Court functionary withdrew.

The Lord President looked at the seal in some embarrassment, for he did not quite know how to break it; it was very large, some three inches across, and was composed of a wax of specially resistant quality.

"Cut it!" said the Prime Minister, and to that end he presented his pocket-knife.

The document was opened; and the Lord President and Prime Minister, glancing together at its contents, suddenly went white.

"Gentlemen," said the Lord President (his voice and hands trembled as he spoke), "his Majesty the King abdicates!"

II

Around that ministerial board it would have been amusing to an impartial onlooker to see how many mouths of grave and reverend Councilors did actually open and drop chins of dismay. A gust of horror and astonishment blew round the assembly; it was a word unknown in the Jingalese Constitution; no place had been there provided for it,—it had never been done. Strictly speaking—legally speaking, that is to say—it could not be done. Kings had been deposed, exiled, their heads cut off—all without their own consent—but never without the consent of Parliament, or of some portion of it at all events. Yet nothing whatever could prevent it; for clearly on this point the King could insist; but, if he did, the Constitution would be in the melting-pot, and the consequences could not be foreseen. What right had this pelican in piety to go pecking his own breast and shedding the blood of his ancestors? Viewed in any constitutional light it was a revolutionary and bloody deed.

The Prime Minister was not slow to see its bearing on the whole political situation and on the fortunes of his ministry.

"Gentlemen," said he, "if this abdication is allowed to take effect, our plans are defeated and the Government must go."

"You mean we shall have to resign?"

"We cannot even do that; we are forestalled. Though not yet publicly announced this is an absolute abdication here and now." And then that all might hear, the Lord President proceeded to read out the terms.

"WE, John, by the Grace of God, King of Jingalo, Suzerain of Rome, Leader of the Forlorn Hope, and Crowned Head of Jerusalem, do hereby solemnly declare, avow, render, and deliver by this as Our own act, freely undertaken and accomplished for the good, welfare, comfort, and succor of the Realm of Jingalo and of its People, that now and from this day henceforward. WE do utterly renounce, relinquish, and abjure all claim to rank, titles, honors, emoluments, and privileges holden by US in virtue of OUR inheritance and succession as true and rightful Sovereign Lord of the said Realm of Jingalo. And for the satisfying of OUR Royal Conscience and the better safety and security of those things aforetime committed to OUR trust and keeping, under the Constitution of the said Realm of Jingalo; to the preservation whereof WE are bound by oath, therefore WE do now pronounce, publish, and set forth, that it may be known to all, this OUR ABDICATION, made in the 25th year of OUR reign and given under OUR hand and signet——"

Then came date and signature; and following these the old form of mixed German and Latin, without which no State document was complete—"Der Rex das vult."

When the reading ended there was a short pause. Here at all events, in their very ears, history was being incredibly made.

"Remarkably well drawn," observed Professor Teller, admiringly: "copied, you may be interested to learn, from the actual instrument wrung by Parliament out of King Oliver the Second under threat of torture four hundred years ago. As legal and regular a form, therefore, as it would be possible to devise."

"You mean we shall have to recognize it?"

"If we recognize anything at all."

"Gentlemen," said the Prime Minister, "it must not be recognized; it would mean for us not merely defeat but disaster. As against the Bishops we have a certain amount of popular opinion to back us; but if once it appears that dislike for our policy has driven the King into abdication, then our ruin will be immediate and irremediable. We have to recognize that during the past year his popularity has greatly increased, while our own, to say the most, is stationary."

"Yes, and he knows it!" said the Minister of the Interior, bitterly.

"I call it a treacherous and a cowardly act!" exclaimed the Secretary for War.

"He is trying to bully us!" said the Commissioner-General.

"I should say that he is succeeding," remarked Professor Teller in a dry tone. "Had we not better recognize, gentlemen, that his Majesty has made a very shrewd hit? Can we not—compromise?"

"Impossible!" asseverated the Prime Minister. "It is too late."

Professor Teller leaned back in his chair and let the discussion flow on. His attitude was noticeable; he was the only minister who was taking it sitting down.

"When does this abdication take effect?" asked one. "I mean, how long can it be kept from the press?"

"Who knows? If his Majesty has done one mad thing he may have done another."

"I must see him at once," said the Premier, "this cannot be allowed to go on."

"You will have to take a very firm tone."

"I would suggest that we all send in our portfolios."

"We have tried that once; he would not accept them now, and we have no power to make him."

"No; that is the damnable thing! That is what makes his position so strong."

"Do you think he knows?"

"Of course; why else has he done it? It's really clever; that's what I can't get over, he has done a clever thing!"

"Who can have put it into his head?"

"It is the most unjustifiable stretch of the royal prerogative that ever I heard of."

"There's no prerogative about it; it's sheer revolution and rebellion."

"An attack on the Constitution, I call it."

Thus they talked.

"Strange!" murmured Professor Teller, irritating them with his philosophic tone and his detached air,—"strange that when it threatens itself with extinction monarchy becomes powerful."

"It is no question of extinction," said the Prime Minister tetchily; "we should still have his successor to deal with; and Prince Max, I can tell you, gentlemen, is a very dark horse. You all know what happened three months ago; and now, within the last week, we have learned that he is publishing a book—a revolutionary book with his own name to it. You may take it from me that if he comes to the throne our present scheme for the evolution of the Cabinet system will be over. Anything may happen! Read his book and you will understand."

"Has any one yet seen it?"

"A privately procured copy has been shown me; it was by the merest chance we heard of it. I could only read it very hurriedly in the small hours; it had to go back where it came from."

"Is it a serious matter?"

"Perfectly appalling."

"And are you going to allow it to be published?"

"How can we prevent? It is being printed abroad."

And then spoke the Prefect of the Police, holding technical place upon the Council as Minister of Secret Service.

"Over the present edition, gentlemen, you may make your minds quite easy. I have received intelligence that last night the establishment at which it was being printed was burned to the ground."

The Premier cast a keen and confidential glance at his colleague.

"How much does that involve?" he asked.

"Only the insurance company, I should suppose."

"I meant of the book?"

"Oh! everything except the manuscript. There will be no publication this year at any rate."

"I make you my compliments," said the Prime Minister, "on the particularity and speed with which your department has become informed. That at all events gives us time."

"And meanwhile?"

"I must see the King immediately. It is no use our remaining here to discuss a situation that is not yet explained. The first thing to find out is whether this has gone any further; but I do not think his Majesty really means it as anything more than a threat."

"Had you no hint that it was coming?" inquired the Commissioner-General.

The Prime Minister was on his way to the door. "No," he said; "not a word." And then he paused, as the particular meaning of a certain carefully chosen and repeated phrase flashed on him for the first time. "He said to me yesterday—repeating what he said four months ago when we tendered our resignations—'I will no longer stand in your way.' And now I suppose we have it."

"Good Heavens!" cried the Minister of the Interior, "does he call this not standing in our way?"

The Prime Minister cast an expressive glance at his chagrined and embarrassed following—a glance of self-confidence and determination, one which still said "Depend upon me!"

But only from one of his colleagues was there any look of answering confidence, or speech confirming it.

"When you are disengaged, Chief, may I have a few moments?"

It was the Prefect who spoke, a man of few words.

Eye to eye they looked at each other for a brief spell.

The Prime Minister nodded. "Come to me in two hours' time," he said. "We shall know then where we are." And so saying he left the room.

III

In the next two days a good many things happened; but carried through in so underground and secret a fashion that it is only afterwards we shall hear of them. And so we come to the last day of all; for on the morrow Parliament closes and when that is done the King's abdication is to become an acknowledged and an accomplished fact.

It was evening. His Majesty had just given a final audience to the Prime Minister; the interview had been a painful one, and still the ground of contention remained the same. But the demeanor of the head of the Government had altered; he had tried bullying and it had failed; now in profound agitation he had implored the King for the last time to withdraw his abdication, and his Majesty had refused.

"I will close Parliament for you," he said, "since you wish it; it will be a fitting act for the conclusion of my reign. But my conscience forbids any furthering on my part of your present line of policy; and as I cannot prevent that obstacle from existing, in accordance with my promise I remove it altogether from the scene."

"But your Majesty's abdication is the greatest obstacle of all, it is a profound upheaval of the whole constitutional system; and its acceptance will involve a far, far greater expenditure of time than we are able to contemplate or to provide for. I am bound, therefore, to appeal from the letter of your Majesty's promise (which no doubt you have observed) to the spirit in which as I conceive it was made."

"When I made it, Mr. Prime Minister, I had no spirit left. Nothing remained to me but the letter of my authority, and even that was dead. I told you that I would no longer stand in your way, and I will keep my word."

"By throwing us into revolution!"

"By throwing you upon your own resources. You have been working very assiduously for single chamber government, you may now secure it in your own way."

"Your Majesty takes a course entirely without precedent."

"What?—Abdication?"

"Against the wish or consent of Parliament."

"Ah, yes," said the King, "that is precisely the difference. Abdications have, like ministerial resignations, been forced upon us—I mean on kings in the past—at very unseasonable times and in most inconsiderate ways; and we kings have had to put up with it. Mr. Prime Minister, it is your turn now; and I only hope that you may find as clean a way out of your difficulty as I had to find when four months ago you threatened me with a resignation which you knew I could not accept."

The Prime Minister's face became drawn with passion; but there was no more to be said after that. "Is that your Majesty's final word?" he inquired.

"I hope so," said the King, rising and making a formal offer of his hand.

And so the interview ended.

Left alone the King felt badly in need of comfort, for now in the hour of triumph depression had begun to enter his soul. He did not like hurting people even when he was not fond of them; and on the Prime Minister's face as he went out he had seen something like tragedy. "Is he going to cut his throat?" he wondered; but, no, it was not the look of a beaten man—rather that of a gambler prepared to make his last throw.

The King had already made his own—he had nothing more to do; and now he wanted companionship, some one to humor him with more understanding and sympathy than his own wife could supply. And it so happened that just then his only two possible comforters were away. Max had gone to the Riviera to recruit before the regular sittings of the Commission began, and Charlotte three days ago had taken that leave of absence which had been promised her; for in less than a month's time the Prince of Schnapps-Wasser would be paying his promised visit.

As he could not have the society he craved he chose solitude, and wandered out into the deepening dusk of the November garden; and there, gazing up through its now thinned foliage at the quiet and misty heavens above him, thought of steeplejacks and the death of kings, and how at the root of every great downfall in history there had probably been some poor human heart like his own, conscious of failure, longing for the kindred touch which pride of place makes so impossible. And yet he knew that he had brought himself to a better end than, with all the defects of his qualities, he could ordinarily have hoped to secure; perhaps this dramatic taking of himself off (which he felt in a way to be so out of character) would help Max to make something out of the situation startling and unexpected. But Max would have to give up the idea of marrying the Archbishop's daughter.

The quiet, dusky paths had led him to a point where high walls carefully shrouded in creepers shut off the royal stables from view. Through circular barred grilles he could hear the noise of horses champing in their stalls; and the comfortable sound drew him round to the entrance. Opening a wicket, he stood in a dimly lighted court, but the buildings surrounding it contained plenty of light, and in the harness rooms a brisk sound of furbishing went on.

Turning to the left he passed into the largest stable of all, a spacious and well-aired chamber of corridor-like proportions divided up into stalls. To right and left of him stood the famous piebald ponies, lazily munching fodder and settling down to their last sleep before the unusual exertions which would be required of them on the morrow.

But these pampered minions did not know as he did what the morrow had in store: how, for the sake of effect, they would be harnessed to a huge obsolete coach weighing a couple of tons, each clad in an elaborate costume of crimson and gold weighing by itself considerably more than a full-grown rider. To the King this presumed ignorance of theirs was a matter for envy; he knew his own part in the affair well enough; the thought of it oppressed him.

He walked down the double line—twelve in all—pausing now and then to take a closer look and judge of their condition, but keeping always at a respectful distance, for he was aware that almost without exception they were an ill-tempered crew. Contemplating the astonishing rotundity of their well-filled bodies, the spacious ease of their accommodation, the outward dignity of circumstances, and the absolute lack of freedom which conditioned their whole existence, he was struck with the resemblance between himself and them; and recalling how, with a similar sense of kinship, St. Francis had preached to the lower forms of life he too became imbued with the spirit of homily and prophecy, though it did not actually find its way into words.

"You and I, little brothers"—so might we loosely interpret the meditations of his heart—"you and I are much of a muchness, and can sing our 'Te Deum' or our 'Nunc Dimittis' in almost the same words. We are both of a carefully selected breed and of a diminished usefulness. But because of our high position we are fed and housed not merely in comfort but in luxury; and wherever we go crowds stand to gape at us and applaud when we nod our heads at them. We live always in the purlieus of palaces, and never have we known what it is to throw up our heels in a green pasture, nor in our old age are we turned out comfortably to grass—only to Nebuchadnezzar by accident came that thing, and he did not appreciate it as he should have done. Never shall we go into battle to prove that we are worth our salt, and to say 'Ha, Ha' to the fighting and the captains; nor is it allowed to us to devour the ground with our speed: whenever we attempt such a thing it is cut from under us. Little brothers, it is before all things necessary that we should behave; for being once harnessed to the royal coach, if any one of us struck work or threw out our heels we should upset many apple-carts and the machinery of the State would be dislocated. Let us thank God, therefore, that long habit and training have made us docile, and that our backs are strong enough to bear the load that is put upon them, and that if one of us goes another immediately fills his place so that he is not missed."

In a vague, unformulated way this was the homily which arose from his meditations; and if he thought at all specially of himself and present circumstances, it was merely as an insignificant exception which proved the general rule.

As he strolled back again he stopped at the door and spoke to the man in charge.

"They all seem very fit, Jacobs," said he. "They do you credit, I must say."

"Fit they are, your Majesty!" said the man, beaming with satisfied pride; "and so they ought to be, considering the trouble we've took with 'em. We've been polishing them like old pewter for days. Ah! they know what's coming; and you can see 'em just longing for it."

"Oh, they like it, do they?"

"Believe me, your Majesty, they couldn't live without it. It's in the blood—been in 'em from father to son. Why, if we didn't take 'em out to help us open and shut Parliament and things of that sort, they'd think we was mad."

This was a new point of view; the King listened to it with respectful interest, and then a fresh thought occurred to him.

"Jacobs," he said, "did one of them ever refuse to go?—on a public occasion, I mean."

"Well, yes, your Majesty, it did once happen; before my time, though. One of 'em—ah, it was at a funeral, too—he stuck his heels into the ground and couldn't be got to start, not for love or money."

"Which did they offer him?"

"Ask pardon, your Majesty?—Oh, just my manner of speaking, that was. Wouldn't go except on his own terms."

"And what were they?"

"Well, your Majesty, he was a clever one, you see, he was; they aren't generally. But he, he'd got a taste for his own set of harness—knew it by the smell, I suppose, and when they come to put it on him a bit of it broke, and he wouldn't wear anything else. That's how it all come about."

"They tried, I suppose?"

"Oh, they got it on him; and they got him out, before all the crowd, with the guns going and the handkerchiefs a-waving—Ah, no; but that was a funeral though—there weren't no handkerchiefs that day. Well, there he was; and when he felt they was all looking at him, and the perishables kept waiting behind——"

"The perishables?"

"The corpse, sir;—then he wouldn't move."

"Very embarrassing, I must say."

"You see, your Majesty, they couldn't beat him in public—not as he deserved; 'twouldn't have been respectful to what was there. They had to do that afterwards. But, believe me, he stopped the whole show for twenty minutes and more; and they never used him again."

"What became of him?"

"Oh, he was just kept, in case; but he weren't never used—he was reckoned too risky after that. Oh, and he felt it too; I haven't a doubt but he did. They don't like only to be one of the extras, they don't."

"What does that mean?"

"Why, you see, sir, there's always four extras here, in case of accident; and believe me, your Majesty, when the four extras to-morrow find 'emselves left out they'll squeal for hours, and it won't be safe to go near 'em, not for days. Blood's a wonderful thing, sir, wonderful! And they know, just as well as you or me."

"And what becomes of them when they grow old?"

"Well, sir, they make saddle-cloths of 'em for the band of the forty-ninth Hussars. Your Majesty may have reckonized 'em; most people think it's giraffe skin, but it's really our old ponies."

"So they come in useful even at the last?"

"Oh, yes, sir, they ends well, one can't deny that; and they have to be in pretty good condition too. So they aren't none of 'em what you might call really old."

"Very interesting," said the King. "What a great deal there is in the world that one doesn't know till one comes to inquire."

"About horses? Your Majesty's right there!" said the man; and his tone spoke volumes of the things which would never be written, but which those who had the care of horses knew.

As the King moved away from that brief colloquy, one phrase in particular stuck in his mind. "He was reckoned too risky after that." Was that, he wondered, what the Prime Minister was thinking about him now; had he, indeed, proved himself too risky for future use? If so there would be no yielding at the eleventh hour; and perhaps it was as well that to-morrow would see him harnessed to the royal coach for the last time.



CHAPTER XV

A DEED WITHOUT A NAME



I

The King and Queen sat in their state coach responding with low bows to the plaudits of the crowd. Their velvets and ermines lay heavy upon them, for although it was now November, the day was close and warm, and there seemed to be thunder in the air.

The King, in this his Jubilee year, had resumed wearing his crown on great State occasions, for he found that the people liked it. He had worn it at the Foot-washing; and every one then admitted that it gave the true symbolic touch to the whole ceremony. And now for the last time he was wearing it again.

Artistically he was right; a cocked hat, of nineteenth-century pattern, does not accord well with robes in the style of the sixteenth. In some countries that mistake is made by royalty out of compliment to the army; but if on these State occasions sartorial compliments are to be paid irrespective of the general effect, then surely your monarch should wear a wig as representative of the law, lawn-sleeves in honor of the Church, and divide the rest of his person impartially between the army, the navy, and the doctors. Thus all the great professions would receive their due recognition, and we should presently find so symbolical a combination just as harmonious and dignified, and as pregnant with meaning, as we do the heraldic quarterings by which the mixed blood of ancestry is so proudly displayed. We can get accustomed to anything if there is a good reason for it; but when we cease to be reasonable, beauty should be our only guide. In this case reason as well as beauty had induced King John of Jingalo to reject the cocked hat and to resume the crown.

The royal coach had already borne its occupants along two miles of the route; and continued exercise was making them warm.

"Good Heavens!" exclaimed the King, "it's very stuffy in here; I feel as if I were in a furnace. Why did you ask to have the windows closed, my dear?"

"It makes one feel so much safer," said the Queen, keeping her stereotyped smile, and sweeping a bow as she spoke.

"Safer from what?" Here his Majesty responded to a fresh burst of cheers.

"Accidents," replied his consort; "one never knows."

"Glass, my dear, does not protect one from the accidents of Kings. Glass can't stop bullets, you know."

"I didn't mean that sort of accident; and I wish you wouldn't talk about them just now."

"You always take out an umbrella when you don't want it to rain; and if one talks about accidents then they don't happen. At least that has always been my experience. What sort of accident do you mean?"

"Dust, and microbes, and infection, and all that sort of thing. There must be a lot of it about in so large a crowd; I wonder how many people with measles."

"What an idea!" exclaimed the King: "people with measles don't come out to see shows."

"Oh, yes, they do,—nursemaids especially. They all catch it from each other in the public parks; at least so I've been told. And whenever I see a perambulator now, I think of it."

"There are no perambulators here to-day," said the King, "so you needn't think about measles. Smallpox if you like; though it strikes me that all I have yet seen are remarkably healthy specimens—considering how many of them there are." And he bowed to the healthy specimens as he spoke.