THE KINGS
OF THE EAST

It was a brilliant afternoon in late spring, and Vindobona was taking its pleasure joyously out of doors, as is its wont. The many parks and gardens of the city were crowded with holiday-makers in every variety of national costume and speaking the tongues of all the earth, and in the boulevards of the Ringstrasse a well-dressed throng made the pavements almost impassable. There was not a vacant seat to be found at the rows of tables outside each café, where strange and wonderful liquids were being consumed in vast quantities, but with a deliberation that implied the possession of unlimited leisure. No one seemed to have anything to do but to walk and talk, salute his acquaintances and criticise the rest of the world, pause for a while to refresh the inner man and then saunter on again, and this was indeed the case. The true citizen of Vindobona always has time for holiday-making, whatever other duties he may neglect, and those who make a study of his weaknesses calculate confidently upon this amiable peculiarity. This saint’s day afternoon, for instance, there were gathered, in a room on the second floor of one of the palatial mansions in the Opera Ring, four men, whose meeting had been facilitated by the absorption of the populace in its pleasures. One by one they had made their way to the appointed spot, the private office of the great financier Israel Goldberg, and here, where a business-like severity strove with a certain barbaric splendour in the appointments, they had refreshed themselves with fruit sherbets and perfumed Eastern tobacco before turning their attention to the matter upon which they had come together. Some signing of papers and a good deal of low-toned conversation followed, until at last the host leaned back in his chair and threw down his pen.

“That is well over,” he said, speaking in German. “The movement is on the verge of realisation; we only await the man.”

“Just so,” said the venerable Scythian Jew at his right hand; “we need our Moses.”

“But where is he to be found in this age of doubt and depression?” asked a sallow-faced young man, with large vague wandering eyes.

The remaining person at the table snorted fiercely. “This is the age of limited liability,” he said. “Our Moses will take the form of a syndicate.”

“With the excellent Texelius as managing director?” asked the Chevalier Goldberg, with a sympathetic smile. “I think not, my dear friend.”

“I rejoice to hear you say that, Israel,” said the old Rabbi, whose susceptibilities had been much ruffled by the irreverent remark of Dr Texelius.

“No,” said the Chevalier, “although we are business men and this is a business matter, we must return, I fear, to the old ways. Without the man to whom I hope to present you this afternoon, our movement would be like a ship without a captain. You, my good Texelius, bring us the help of science, in my young friend Rubenssohn we have the support of literature, and our venerable Rabbi Schaul assures us of the blessing of orthodoxy, while I myself supply the not unnecessary item of money. But we must, besides all these, have brains.”

Dr Texelius was understood to reply that no gathering which included himself could be considered deficient in that particular, whatever might be said of the rest of the company, but his host smiled with pitying gentleness.

“My good Texelius, we all admit that you are unapproachable in your own line. You have enabled all the half-educated people in Europe to gabble a parody of your philosophy with more than your own brutality of language, and have taught them new bad names to call their neighbours by. But when it is a matter of conducting diplomatic negotiations of the highest delicacy, something more is needed.”

“I see no need of diplomacy,” protested Dr Texelius. “We have the Grand Seignior’s promise, and we hold the money-bags. The Land is ours, and we have only to keep it, which is an affair of the sword, not of the tongue.”

“And surely,” said young Rubenssohn, “it is the Gentiles who will sue for our favour, not we for theirs?”

“Israel will become at once the exemplar and the monitress of the world,” said the Rabbi. “Her central position, separated from the nations and yet vitally connected with all of them, her theocratic government, and the purity of her family life, will make her not only the model state of the new century, but the natural arbitrator in international quarrels.”

The Chevalier Goldberg smiled again, but less patiently. “My dear good friends,” he said, “do you think the world and its inhabitants will all undergo a radical change because Israel has obtained permission from Czarigrad to re-colonise Palestine? I tell you that as soon as our scheme is known, it will become the butt for the malice and jealousy of the whole earth. The hostile nations will unite against us; our own friends will be swept into the vortex. To enable us to surmount the crisis before us, we need a leader of such varied gifts and experiences as it would seem almost impossible to find combined in a single individual. In fact, there is only one man in Europe, perhaps in the world, who possesses them, and I expect him here in a few minutes.”

“And who may this heaven-sent leader be?” sneered Dr Texelius.

“I see him now, coming round the corner of the Opera-house,” pursued the Chevalier, who from his seat by the window could obtain a view through the openings of the sun-blind. “That is he—the short man with the light moustache.”

“An Englishman, evidently,” said Rubenssohn; “or he would not walk to keep an appointment when he might drive.”

“Right, Herschel my son. He is an Englishman. But,” and the Chevalier dropped the blind which he had partially drawn up, and turned away from the window and the sounds of voices, laughter, and crowding footfalls which it admitted, “he is also a true cosmopolitan. For over ten years he was a king in all but name, and might, had he cared to do it, have married a queen.”

“What! You too have been taken captive by the Mortimer idea?” cried Dr Texelius. “Our Thracian friends can’t find words to deplore his loss. To hear them one might indeed think him Moses and David rolled into one.”

“Is your friend really the man who was Prime Minister of Thracia, and was overthrown by foreign intrigues the day that the young King attained his majority, Chevalier?” asked Rubenssohn eagerly. “He has always seemed to me a heroic figure in an unheroic age.”

“What I want to know is, how much are you going to pay him?” vociferated Dr Texelius, while the Chevalier smiled rather drily. Before he could answer the question, a deferential servant at the door announced “His Excellency Count Mortimer,” and ushered in a grey-haired man, whose keen blue eyes appeared to take the measure of all the occupants of the room at a single glance.

“Ah, my frient! You hef arrifed, den?” cried the Chevalier in English. “Beholt us all awaitink your pleassure. Dis fenerable clerchymen iss our goot frient de Rabbi Schaul, and here iss de worlt-renowned scientist Dr Texelius. Dis younk men iss Herschel Rubenssohn, de Poet off de Ghetto, a redical in theory, but aristocret by nature.”

The Chevalier laughed meaningly, for while the Rabbi had risen from his chair and bowed low at the introduction, not without a touch of the servility of manner natural to one who sees a probable and powerful enemy in every man of superior rank, Rubenssohn had half-risen and then resumed his seat, conscious of the critical eye of Dr Texelius, who acknowledged the stranger’s entrance merely by a nod. Count Mortimer was accustomed to associate with kings and queens, and Dr Texelius was an austere Republican, hating an aristocrat, moreover, as an anomaly in nature—a specimen which would not allow itself to be weighed and measured and labelled by his philosophy. Aristocrats worshipped an absurd fetish called honour, some of the manifestations of which could by no means be reduced to the profit and loss denominator to which he referred all human actions, and for some reason or other these same misguided people regarded themselves as superior to him. It was evident, at least, that this one did, or what was the meaning of the scarcely veiled irony in his glance as, after shaking hands with the Chevalier, he bowed to the rest?

“I am fortunate,” said Count Mortimer, “in meeting two gentlemen of such European reputation as Dr Texelius and Mr Rubenssohn. Of Dr Schaul I heard much while I lived in Thracia; and when I learned that he was throwing himself heartily into this movement, it seemed to me a fact of the happiest augury for the future.”

“And pray, noble sir, are we to think the same of your own connection with the movement?” asked Dr Texelius.

“The answer to that question lies largely in your own hands, Herr Professor. Am I to rely upon your loyal support, or not?”

“My dear Count,” interposed the host, in German, “these gentlemen are prepared to support you to the utmost of their power. I have just made them see that without your kind offices we could have no hope of success.”

“I am glad to hear it, Chevalier. Perhaps it will set our friends’ minds at ease if I explain, first of all, that I derive no pecuniary benefit from my connection with the movement. A busy man does not take kindly to an idle life, and I am glad to employ my leisure for so good an object.”

“And do you wish us to understand that you cut yourself off from your class, and range yourself on the side of Israel in the sight of the world, purely for the sake of occupation and philanthropy?” snarled Dr Texelius.

“Herr Professor, I am a man who has not a little to avenge. If I choose to combine my own pleasure with the advantage of your nation, you will do well to be thankful and accept my help. Do we understand one another?”

“Your Excellency does not mince matters, nor will I. What guarantee have we that the interests of Israel will not be sacrificed to your own?”

“Your frankness charms me. You have no guarantee. But without my help the interests of Israel will remain where they are at present.”

“Prove it!” shouted Dr Texelius. “How are we to know that you have the power to do what you pretend?”

“Simply by waiting to see. But do not mistake me, Herr Professor. I believe that you and Mr Rubenssohn enjoy considerable influence with the Jewish press. If we are to work together that influence must be employed exclusively and loyally on my side, which is your own. Should there be the slightest attempt to weaken my position, or to form a cabal against me among your followers, I shall take my choice between getting rid of you and ceasing my efforts on behalf of Israel, which will then be far worse off than it is now. Do I make myself plain?”

“Your Excellency’s demand is only reasonable,” said Rubenssohn; while Dr Texelius spluttered inarticulately. “Such influence as a poor poet may possess is placed unreservedly at your service.”

“And if your influence is used wrongly, my excellent Texelius,” said the Chevalier Goldberg, “I shall find myself under the painful necessity of ceasing to finance your newspapers, when the annoyance will die a natural death.”

“My fears are not for myself,” was the sulky response. “If the Gentile is loyal to Zion, he shall have my support. But what reason is there for his joining us, and what good can he do us? That’s what I want to know.”

“Friend,” said the Rabbi reprovingly, “if the noble gentleman is willing to forsake his own people and cast in his lot with Israel, is it for us to sneer at his chivalrous offer and throw doubt upon his motives? Surely he is one of the sons of the stranger who shall build the walls of Zion.”

Cyril Mortimer bowed gravely to the Rabbi. “I give Dr Texelius free leave to trust me in private no further than he can see me, provided that he supports me in public,” he said. “And now that this is settled, perhaps we may come to a clear understanding of the position. Through my friend the Chevalier Goldberg I am informed that you, gentlemen, form the executive of the guild called the Children of Zion, that your object is to colonise Palestine with Jews from Europe, buying out the present inhabitants where necessary, and that you are in command of a certain sum of money for this purpose, invested on proper security in a series of commercial schemes?”

“Of which the control is in Jewish hands,” interjected Dr Texelius.

“Quite so. I understand also that the Chevalier has volunteered to bear the entire cost of obtaining the necessary concession from Roum, leaving you at liberty to devote the whole of your trust-funds to the work of colonisation. Indeed, gentlemen, you are to be congratulated. What with a sum of money to be paid down at the outset, and a yearly rent for the province, together with the necessary compensation, palm-oil, and perquisites, my friend will sacrifice a very large part of his fortune in giving your movement a favourable start. I honour his motives, and I only hope you appreciate his generosity.”

“If Goldberg had shown this generosity ten years ago, the Land would be already repopulated by a thriving race of colonists,” said Dr Texelius.

“There, Herr Professor, you are in error. The Chevalier could not show this generosity ten years ago for two reasons. In the first place, it has been the labour of years for him to establish the agreement now arrived at between the Jews of all nations, by which they bind themselves to assist the Children of Zion by bringing pressure on their respective Governments when it is needed. Without this solidarity of action, a band of selfish plutocrats in any one country might have overthrown the whole scheme. And in the second place, ten years ago I was not at liberty to devote myself to assuring the success of the movement.”

“Which is now secured by your Excellency’s adhesion.” The tone was sarcastic in the extreme.

“You are very good, Herr Professor. To me it falls to direct the working of this new machine. Without a single head, to ensure the application of the pressure at the right moment and the right spot, the financial union would soon break up, or at best fall to pieces. It is my aim to produce the necessary effect before disintegration sets in, and I may say I have every hope of success. The Children of Zion may colonise Palestine, but it is the United Nation Syndicate that will make their work possible.”

“Under your Excellency’s guidance.”

“I hope so. You will perceive now the necessity there is for absolute unanimity. Our enemies will be on the watch for the slightest sign of dissension. There is one point upon which it may be desirable to give you a special warning. You are aware of the fanaticism of the Scythians and others with regard to the Holy Places? Now I think it highly probable that I shall be obliged to consent to the appointment of a Christian prince as governor-general, as a guarantee against their desecration.”

“Oho, the thin end of the wedge!” cried Dr Texelius. “A Christian governor—a prince, too—with a Christian Court and army and executive. Where is our free and independent republic, in which the Jew might at last obtain security and justice? Rubenssohn—Rabbi—you have heard the Gentile speak, will you still believe that his forked tongue utters truth?”

“Friend Texelius, you insult his Excellency,” said Rabbi Schaul. “How can it signify to us what precautions the Gentiles take in the vain hope of maintaining their ascendancy over Zion? Of what use would it be to us to draw up the wisest republican constitution, which would last but a day? Once we are restored to the land, He will come whose right it is to reign, and neither Christian prince nor atheistic republic can stand against Him.”

“Beautiful dream!” murmured Rubenssohn, his eyes kindling, “but it is only a dream. A literal Messiah is an impossibility. The house of David is extinct, the monarchical principle incapable of revival among us. The Grand Seignior may play the part of the Messiah in bringing us back, or there may be before us a Messianic age of peace and plenty, such as the prophets picture, but we need look for nothing more.”

“Young man, will you limit the Holy One of Israel? A few years ago this return, for which we are planning, was counted impossible, but it is now at hand. The appearance and reign of Messiah will follow in due time.”

“Rabbi, you are a dreamer!” cried Dr Texelius angrily. “Will you allow your absurd visions to interfere with practical politics?”

“Visions? You call the prophecies of the Divine Word absurd visions?” cried the Rabbi, trembling with mingled anger and alarm. “Let me go, Israel Goldberg. I dare not sit at the same table as this unbeliever.”

“No, no; Texelius spoke more strongly than he intended,” said the Chevalier, whose hair had grown grey in the endeavour to induce the orthodox and free-thinking sections of his co-religionists to work together. “He has the highest respect for your views, Rabbi, and I, as you know, share them.”

“Well, let him show his respect for the prophecies by abandoning his opposition to Count Mortimer,” said the old man, supporting himself with his shaking hands upon the table, “or I must withdraw from all association with him, and call upon my flock to do the same.”

“I agree,” said Dr Texelius hastily, for the defection of Rabbi Schaul’s following would have been a serious blow to the movement. “Perhaps you will own some day, Rabbi, that it would have been better to take the advice of a practical man, but by all means let us all become dreamers together.”

“If the learned Dr Texelius had listened more carefully to what I said,” remarked Cyril, “he would have noticed that I proposed only to consent to the appointment, not to make it. That will be the business of the Powers, and while they are wrangling over it we are establishing ourselves in Palestine.”

“But they will soon perceive that,” said Rubenssohn.

“True; but I shall propose a commission, composed of the various consuls, to take charge of the Holy Places until the governor is appointed. That will lead to further wrangling, but it will only give us more time.”

“But why is time so necessary?” asked Rubenssohn.

“To enable us to import our Jews. You understand, Dr Texelius, there must be no interference with Christian communities or forcible dispossession of Moslems, nothing to give a pretext for European intervention. If you can’t buy one piece of ground easily, turn to another. Do everything quietly, settle your Jews wherever there is room for them, and then we can confidently demand a plébiscite of the whole country, if we see the opportunity, or at least ask permission to elect a temporary governor until the Powers have agreed on their nominee. I need scarcely say that if the colonists possessed a spark of gratitude, their choice would fall on Dr Texelius, and the Powers might even be brought to confirm that appointment.”

“So!” cried Dr Texelius, with evident pleasure, “I perceive that you are not wholly a dreamer, Count.”

“Few men less so, Herr Professor. We are agreed, then? You will hurry on your part of the work by every means in your power, while I do my best to keep the attention of Europe fixed upon side-issues?”

“And if you are agreed upon that,” cried the host, when the rest had signified their assent, “it would be as well for us to separate. I have been on thorns all the afternoon, lest the police should have noticed you coming to this house, friends. Unless the movement is to be rudely checked, you ought all to be on your way back to your own countries to-night.”

At this very plain hint the conference broke up, its members leaving the mansion singly. The Rabbi went first, shuffling down the grand staircase in his shabby clothes, a decrepit figure in whom the most lynx-eyed police agent would have found a difficulty in recognising the chief spiritual guide of multitudes of orthodox Jews in Pannonia and Southern Scythia. Rubenssohn, who had lived in England long enough to pass on the Continent for an Englishman, left the house openly, but by a different door, after taking a reverential farewell of Cyril, Dr Texelius utilising the moment by whispering to the Chevalier—

“I have classified your friend, Goldberg. His ambition is enormous, amounting, indeed, to mania. If Europe will not admire him, Europe may hate him, but it shall not disregard him.”

And Dr Texelius stumped down the stairs with an aggressive air peculiarly his own, which he joined on this occasion with the stateliness of demeanour proper to the future president of the Hebrew Republic. Meeting on the threshold a young Jewish savant, who had made the great philosopher’s acquaintance at a scientific congress, he responded affably to the timid greeting of the neophyte, and piqued his curiosity by informing him that he had just been investigating a very interesting case of lunacy.

Cyril and the Chevalier Goldberg, left alone together, looked at one another and smiled as the Professor’s footsteps died away.

“Well, Count,” said the host, “you hef seen our tools. What iss de prospect off your beink able to work wid dem?”

“The Rabbi is a fanatic and Rubenssohn an enthusiast,” was the reply; “but I had rather work with either of them than with our scientific friend. There is no one so suspicious as the man who has neither faith nor enthusiasm himself. However, we can’t afford to have his influence arrayed against us, so we must make the best of him.”

“Den you hef decided to ranche yourself on our side? What are your plens, my dear Count?”

“I think it will be best to go to Ludwigsbad, as I intended. Every one will be there this season.”

“True; all de great people, but you will be greater den any. Oh, my frient, let me hef my way about dis. You shell treffel like a prince, you shell hef a whole wink of de best hotel resserfed for you. De worlt shell see det Israel iss not ungrateful to de Christian det helps her.”

“I thought we had threshed this matter out already, Chevalier. Can’t you see that the more I am seen to act on my own initiative, and the less as the agent of the United Nation, the better it is for both of us? I am the friendly go-between, the honest broker, no more. My out-of-pocket expenses I will accept, but nothing else, not even a commission. Living modestly, they can scarcely accuse me of having been bought by you, the next step to which would be that they would try to offer a higher price themselves.”

“I see you are right, but I must hef your promise det you will not spare me in de way off expense. Entertainments, chourneys, telegrephs—nothink must be wantink det might lighten your labours or edd to de success off your mission. You promise me dis? And det second secretary you talked off—you will let me profide you wid de best I can find?”

“Thanks, Chevalier, but I won’t have a Jew. Anything that would identify me in the general mind with your nation is to be avoided. I think of getting an Englishman, as the fellow will be more for ornament than use. Paschics is a perfect glutton for work, but when he is thrown into general society he cannot forget that he began life as a farm-labourer, and he becomes either servile or truculent. No one knows and regrets the fact better than he does, and he suggested himself that I should have some one else to receive visitors and do the light work, while he grapples with the bulk of it behind the scenes as he always has done.”

“You hef indeed an atteched follower, Count.”

“One attached follower, you may as well say, Chevalier, unless you count my servant, who is a faithful fool of the same sort.”

“My frient,” the Chevalier laid aside his smiling mask, and approached Cyril with intense solemnity as he stood leaning against the window-frame, “I must ask you once more, hef you counted de cost off throwink in your lot wid us? At pressent, you are de most successful failure in Europe. Dere iss not one sofereign det would not obtain your help if he could, not one state det would not be enxious if deir enemies were employink you. You are receifed eferywhere, you may merry whom you please—for dere are heiresses off de noblest femilies det would think nothink off gifink you deir whole fortune, if only dey might accompany it—you are de frient off all de most powerful people. Will you gif up all dis for de sake off de oppressed Chews? We know what contempt—ill-treatment—iss like, for we are born to it; but you, a Christian and a noble, how will you bear it? Dey will treat you worse den us, for dey will say you are a traitor to dem.”

“My dear Chevalier,” the sarcasm had left Cyril’s tone, and he looked at the stout little Jew with an earnestness almost equalling his own, “you are wasting your pity on me. After the knock-down blow I got two years ago, I must fight my way up again from the foot of the hill, and it won’t make it any harder to do it in your cause. What I want is power, and with reasonable luck I stand to get it by means of this scheme. As to the personal consequences, don’t trouble yourself about them. I knew what it was to be socially ostracised long ago in Thracia, and it did me no harm. I shall continue to be received wherever I like to go. As to marrying, there is only one woman in the world that I would choose to marry, and she is out of my reach already. I am committed to this enterprise, and I have no wish to draw back. Now what is it that has led you to make me this undesired offer of release?”

“Dere iss noose from Czarigrad,” answered the Chevalier, in a tone in which relief blended with disappointment. “Chust before our meetink to-day I receifed a secret message det Hercynia hed discofered our negotiations wid Roum, and was puttink pressure on de Grand Seignior to refuse us our concession. Dey must hef heard off your fissit to his Machesty.”

“Ah, this is the declaration of war, then! Well, I am glad Hercynia has opened the ball, because I have such an excellent object-lesson in store for her. Let me see, Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal passes through Vindobona to-morrow on his way home from Czarigrad. He will spend a few hours here with his sister, Countess Temeszy. Count Temeszy is an old friend of my brother’s, and will get me an interview without making any fuss. I shall see him to-night at the Opera, and we will settle things then. To-morrow the Chancellor shall have his warning, and we shall see whether it is necessary to proceed to extremities.”

“Once you hef approached him on behalf off Israel, dere will be no drawink-back,” said the Chevalier.

“There is none now. Well, Chevalier, I must be going.”

“But you will lose no time in seekink det noo secretary?”

“Certainly not. My brother will help me in the matter. There was a young fellow hanging about at Llandiarmid the last time I was there who would suit me well enough, but I daresay he has found something better to do by this time.”

“Farewell den, my frient. You may depend on me to keep you well posted in all de mofements off de enemy. I hef efery confidence in you, but I entreat you not to spare expense.”

Cyril smiled as he succeeded in making his escape. It would have been a standing marvel to him, had he been inclined to waste time in theorising on the weaknesses of human nature instead of profiting by them, that the great financier, whose name ensured respect throughout the civilised world, should repose this absolute and deferential confidence in an unsuccessful statesman, whose sole political capital was now his vast experience, and a certain strength of head, combined with coldness of heart, which had much advantaged him in the past. But Cyril was one who took things as he found them, and made prompt use of them; and the doglike fidelity with which the Chevalier Goldberg clung to his fallen fortunes struck him merely as a very serviceable fact, which, though it might be strange, was by no means to be neglected.

CHAPTER II.
FIRING THE FIRST SHOT.

Returning to his hotel, Cyril found a letter awaiting him in the handwriting of his brother, Lord Caerleon.

“What’s up?” he said to himself, as he opened the envelope and drew out the closely written sheets. “Something must be wrong for Caerleon to favour me with such an imposing epistle. Probably some kind mischief-maker on this side of the Channel has told him that I have given myself over body and soul to the Jews, and he is trying to avert the catastrophe. It would save time to burn the letter and wire to him that the deed is done, but that might hurt his feelings, so here goes!”

He lit a cigar and sat down with the air of a martyr to read the letter, but his brow cleared when he found that it contained none of the anxious entreaties he had expected. His brother needed his help, it seemed, and the occasion of the request was curiously connected with the subject of his conversation with the Chevalier Goldberg.

“You may remember,” wrote Lord Caerleon, “a young fellow named Mansfield, who prepared Usk for college, and was staying with us when you were here two years ago. He is a thoroughly nice chap, and as we all took a fancy to him, Usk has brought him down again two or three times since he has been at Cambridge. That was all very well, but why should he take it into his head to fall in love with Phil? I suppose you will smile your superior smile when you read that sentence; but I give you my word that the thought of such a thing had never entered my mind. It’s only yesterday that Phil was about as high as the table, and running wild about the park with her hair flying loose. How is an unsuspecting parent to know that she has suddenly grown up, and is actually old enough to contemplate matrimony? I can tell you it was a frightful shock to Nadia and me. We sat looking at one another in consternation, until Nadia rallied sufficiently to remind me in a faint voice that the child will be twenty-one next month. Many girls are married before that, as she very truly added, but what comfort does that afford when one finds oneself all at once regarded as a stern and venerable elder? Well, as I said, we can have no possible objection to young Mansfield himself, except on the ground that he has nothing to do. He is a distant connection of Forfar’s, and has the promise of a private secretaryship when a vacancy occurs, but that may not be for years. He has been hanging on at Cambridge since he took his degree, writing prize essays and (at least this is my private idea) keeping Master Usk up to the mark; but he sees as clearly as I do that that can’t go on. He came to me very honourably when he first discovered the state of his feelings, and said that he did not dare ask me to sanction an engagement at present, but if he could get some settled employment, might he speak to Philippa? You know that desperation will make the most guileless of men artful, and therefore you won’t wonder that I resorted to a mean expedient in order to keep my daughter a little longer. I said that Phil was so very young for her age, and had seen so little of the world (this is absolutely true, you know), that I should prefer him not to speak to her for a year in any case. In the meantime he might be getting something to do, and she should have a London season, and pay a visit to her godmother in Germany. It was a bitter pill, I could see, but he took it very well, and left Llandiarmid without saying a word to Phil, so that she knows nothing about the business. At least, that is my contention; but Nadia is under the impression that Phil has her own ideas on the subject. Still, the child is not pining, or I should give way at once. No doubt she sees, like a sensible girl, that it is the best possible thing for the young fellow not to be at a loose end any longer. Well, old man, you see by this time what I want of you. Do you know any one among your acquaintances who would take an Englishman as secretary, who is nothing very great in the way of attainments, but has the memory of a second-class in Modern Languages to fall back upon? He has travelled a good deal, and is a thoroughly pleasant fellow, rather too literary for my taste, but there’s no harm in that. He has something of his own since his father’s death, so that a high salary is not an object; what he wants is to be set to regular work, and taught to run in harness. If you know of anything suitable, I will bless you for ever, for my conscience is pricking me (and I believe Nadia, in her secret thoughts, blames me too) for condemning Phil and this inconvenient youth to a lengthy separation just because I don’t want to lose the child.” ...

Long before he had reached this point, Cyril’s mind was made up, and his answer to his brother’s letter contained his response to the appeal made to him:—

“I want a second secretary, and your Mansfield is the very man for me. Please write to him at once, and let him meet me at the Hôtel Waldthier at Ludwigsbad this day week. We shall not haggle about terms, though Paschics will continue to do most of the work. By the bye, if association with me is likely to do your young friend harm in the future, don’t let him come, but if there is no risk of his suffering in that way, he may take my word for it that he will learn a good deal that will be of use to him.”

About two o’clock the next day Cyril presented himself at Count Temeszy’s house for his interview with the Hercynian Imperial Chancellor, who was paying a strictly private visit of twelve hours or so to his sister. When Cyril’s request was sprung upon him at the Opera, Gyula Temeszy had declared roundly that there was no prospect of his brother-in-law’s visiting Vindobona at present. When it appeared, however, that Cyril was well acquainted with the Baron’s movements, he not only promised him the desired interview, but invited him to lunch. This invitation Cyril refused, in view of the complications which might ensue when Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal had told his hosts of his discoveries at Czarigrad, and he had reason to congratulate himself upon his foresight. The Temeszy servants, who had hitherto bowed almost to the ground before him, received him on this occasion with a perfunctory civility that was little less than insulting; and when they turned him over to Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal’s personal attendant, the man’s manner showed a scarcely veiled insolence. Ushering Cyril into an unoccupied room, he promised to carry the noble Count’s name to his master, but added that his Excellency was very much engaged, and might not be able to see him. For a quarter of an hour Cyril waited impatiently, within earshot of the luncheon-room in which, to judge from the noise and laughter, the Baron was the life and soul of a jovial party, then he rose and rang the electric bell sharply.

“Present my compliments to his Excellency,” he said, watch in hand, when the servant appeared, “and tell him that as the fifteen minutes I was able to spare him have expired, I regret not to be able to see him.”

The man, taken aback by this turning of the tables, poured forth a torrent of apologies and entreaties, but Cyril waved them aside, and passed down the grand staircase with a calm hauteur of demeanour which compelled the respect of the servants in the hall. This time none of them failed in the due observances, and he left the house like an honoured guest. Before he had gone more than a few steps, Count Temeszy ran after him, bare-headed.

“Pray come back, Mortimer. I can’t think what the servants were doing, that they didn’t send in your name.”

“Sorry I have no time to spare.”

“Nonsense; come back. I can’t let Caerleon’s brother be turned away from my door like this.”

Count Temeszy spoke with evident embarrassment, and Cyril was quick to draw the inference that he was now only to be tolerated as Caerleon’s brother. He withdrew his arm from the Hungarian’s grasp.

“Thanks, Temeszy; but there are doors enough open to me without darkening those where I am unwelcome. I will tell Caerleon how faithful you are to your ideas of friendship.”

“But my brother-in-law is most anxious to see you. He is awaiting you at this moment with the greatest eagerness.”

“My dear Count Temeszy, you only increase my regret that I cannot possibly spare him another moment. I am lunching at the Café Viborg, and you must excuse me if I hurry away.”

Leaving Count Temeszy disconsolate on the pavement, Cyril disengaged himself with a ceremonious bow, and walked on. It was without any surprise that, when he was seated at his lunch a little later, he saw the Count and his brother-in-law enter the café. Glancing in his direction as if accidentally, they crossed the room to speak to him, and almost immediately a friend on the other side of the place claimed Count Temeszy’s attention. With a muttered apology, he joined him at his table, and Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal sat down casually opposite Cyril.

“You had something to say to me, I believe?” he remarked.

“Not that I know of,” was the disconcerting reply. “Hearing that you would be in Vindobona, I set aside a quarter of an hour for you for the sake of auld lang syne, but that was all.”

“My brother-in-law understood that you were most anxious to see me. In fact, he was lamenting all morning that you had refused his invitation to lunch, until I reminded him that it was perhaps just as well, for at such short notice it would be difficult to ensure that there should be no pork on the table.”

Cyril smiled. “You are in good spirits to-day, Baron. Still, I would advise you, as a friend, to let your jokes remain entirely between ourselves. Other people might fail to appreciate them.”

“That is as I please,” snapped the Baron. “Once more, have you anything to say to me?” as Cyril raised his eyebrows in well-bred surprise at his tone.

“Nothing whatever,” said Cyril, choosing a cigarette with care. “Allow me to offer you—— You will not? No?”

“Perhaps,” said the Baron darkly, leaning across the table, “you are not aware that I know all about your visit to Czarigrad, and the part you played there?”

“My dear Baron, this is ancient history. I am not aware that there is any reason why the whole world should not know as much.”

“You have no objection to the world’s knowing that you have sold yourself to the Jews, that you are the paid agent of the enemies of Christendom?”

“If it was true, I should probably object very much. As things are, I can only admire your simple faith, Baron.”

“At least,” said the Baron, changing his tactics suddenly, “neither you nor your new allies will benefit by your diplomacy on this occasion. I fancy I have put a spoke in your wheel, my dear Count.”

“What!”—there was unmistakable alarm in Cyril’s voice—“you have not been so unwise as to interfere? When it was suggested to me the other day that you might possibly do so, I laughed at the notion. ‘The Baron is my friend and a man of sense,’ I said, ‘he could not do such a foolish thing.’ And now you wish me to understand that you have done it? My dear Baron, I am deeply concerned. Is there no way in which we can release you from this very unfortunate impasse?”

“I don’t understand you,” with evident anxiety. “Surely you are confusing my position with your own?”

“Baron, this is not the time for joking. Is it possible that in the course of your researches at Czarigrad you never discovered that the Palestine scheme and your Anatolian concession stand or fall together?”

“Pray, what do you know about the Anatolian concession, Count?”

“Just as much as I need to know. I am aware that it is of a very far-reaching character, and that a high and illustrious personage in Hercynia is determined to obtain it. You could not imagine, Baron, that I, your friend, could remain ignorant of your troubles of the last few months? Do you think I don’t know of the immense difficulties you have had to encounter, and the fact that your Emperor is graciously pleased to believe that you are secretly opposing his will and encouraging the Grand Seignior to refuse to grant the concession? Your continuance in office depends upon your obtaining it, I am well aware, and now you have deliberately postponed it for an indefinite time. This is terrible!”

“The whole thing is your doing!” burst from the Chancellor. Cyril eyed him with mild reproof.

“This accusation is unworthy of you, Baron, when I am doing my best to extricate you from your deadlock.”

“Tell me exactly what your threats are worth. Whether you are a paid agent of the Children of Zion, or a Quixotic philanthropist,” sneeringly, “the trap is yours, I know that.”

“I have neither the power nor the necessity to threaten. I simply say that if our concession is refused, yours will be refused also, or if ours is merely delayed, yours will suffer in the same way. If ours is granted——”

“Yes?” with intense eagerness.

“Yours will also be granted when the time comes, and Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal will continue to be the chief ornament of the Hercynian bureaucracy and the favoured adviser of his sovereign.”

“What are they paying you for this?” broke out the Baron. “Thunder and lightning, man! if you are hard up, why not apply to us? We would have found some place for you, or screwed a decent subsistence out of ungrateful Thracia. Why accept the first offer, instead of waiting for a higher?”

“You are agitated, my dear Baron. Take one of these cigarettes, just to please me, and calm yourself. Did you ever, in the course of our former dealings together, find that any good came of trying to insult me?”

“Never; I always paid for it dearly. Yes, you are right, I am a fool. No doubt I am expiating at this moment the errors of my last interview with you. What?” as Cyril’s impassive face relaxed slightly, “I am right. Oh, pray consider all that I said about money withdrawn. You are taking your revenge upon Europe, I see. You would destroy the world, if you could, to punish the faults of mankind towards you.”

“This is very interesting, Baron, but not particularly practical.”

“No? Well, tell me, how can you and your Children of Zion, with their hoarded centimes and kopecks and piastres, hope to oppose yourselves to the power of the Hercynian empire? We can tire you out at Czarigrad, simply because we have a longer purse.”

“I will let you into a secret, Baron. Try your experiment, and oppose our concession. You will find that it is not you who will tire us out, but we you, and for this reason, that you will be pitting yourself against all the Jews in the world. The Children of Zion are backed by a syndicate composed of the capitalists of all nations, and Hercynia would scarcely be well advised to enter on a war with them. I don’t ask you to accept this merely on my authority. Make the experiment, and you will see whether the result bears out my warning.”

“This is a very serious matter, Count.” The Baron had sat lost in wonder, supporting his chin on his hand, for some minutes. “Do you see that you are practically declaring war on Europe?”

“Not quite, Baron. It is not necessary for all Europe to oppose itself to the United Nation. Think of the other side of the picture. What a future would lie before the country which had the support of all the Jews in the world!”

Baron de la Mothe von Elterthal drew a long breath. “You dazzle me, Count! Am I to understand this as an offer?”

“As a conditional offer,” said Cyril, rising; “conditional on your supporting us at Czarigrad. I will leave you to think it over, for I must get back to my hotel, unless I am to lose the train for Charlottenbad.”

“We part as—as friends, I hope? Gyula,” as Count Temeszy paused near them, in the course of an impatient promenade up and down the room, “I am venturing to ofter Count Mortimer a seat in your carriage. We might drive him to his hotel.”

“With the greatest pleasure,” said Count Temeszy, in hopeless bewilderment, and presently the servants were edified to behold Count Mortimer seated beside the Hercynian Chancellor in their master’s carriage, and not only escorted up the steps of the hotel by the man who had denounced him that morning as a pervert to Judaism, but fervently embraced at parting. As for Cyril himself, it did not surprise him in the least to receive, a week later, a cipher telegram from the Chevalier Goldberg to the following effect:—

“Hercynian opposition suddenly withdrawn, after various attempts to out-manœuvre us in matter of Anatolian concession. Fear secrecy is now at an end, for business has become known to English journalist. Suspect Hercynian Embassy at Czarigrad of communicating news, hoping to rouse Scythia to action.”

“So!” murmured Cyril to himself, in the long-drawn, meditative German fashion, as he translated the cipher. “Then the battle is beginning in earnest. That is a smart dodge of yours, my dear Baron, to set Scythia on our track, knowing that we can’t hope to bring the matter home to you. I suppose the English papers all revelled in a nice little sensation yesterday. Mr Mansfield!”

Cyril was sitting in the balcony belonging to his appartement in the Hôtel Waldthier at Ludwigsbad, and a young man came hurriedly to the window in answer to his summons. There was nothing in any way remarkable about the new secretary’s appearance—at least to an English eye. Brown-haired and hazel-eyed, tall, broad-shouldered, and carelessly dressed, he would have been passed over at home as “a most ordinary-looking man,” but on the Continent it was his fate to attract attention as a typical Englishman wherever he went.

“Have you found anything in the papers about our business?” Cyril asked him.

“I was just going to bring your Excellency this.” Mansfield tendered a Vindobona evening journal to his employer.

“Just read me the paragraph. And by the way, don’t ‘Excellency’ me in private. The King was good enough to continue me in the use of the title when I left Thracia, but it may be kept for state occasions. And don’t call me ‘sir,’ as you have done once or twice, or it will get about that I am arrogating to myself princely honours. I must ask you to address me as ‘Count,’ if your instinctive veneration for me demands the use of some epithet.”

The reproof was given so genially that it was impossible to take offence, and Mansfield, who had grown very red, returned gradually to his normal colour, and translated the paragraph with very fair fluency:—

“The London ‘Fleet Street Gazette’ publishes a telegram from its correspondent in Czarigrad which exposes a deep-laid conspiracy on the part of the Jews to possess themselves of Palestine. A concession is on the point of being obtained from the Grand Seignior which authorises the development of the whole country by a Hebrew syndicate, and its colonisation by Jewish immigrants. The intermediary at Czarigrad is understood to have been the Englishman Mortimer, of Thracian notoriety.”

Mansfield’s voice dropped when he came to the last word, and he glanced fearfully at Cyril, expecting to find him pained, possibly indignant; but seeing that he was smoking placidly, he took heart of grace.

“I expected this. Are you a thin-skinned person, Mansfield?”

“I don’t think so—I really don’t know,” stammered Mansfield.

“I mean, can you stand being generally cold-shouldered, if not actually cut? Do you yearn for constant communion with your kind?”

“I suppose I could stand being sent to Coventry without whining. Is that the sort of thing?”

“Exactly. If I am not mistaken, that is the fate which will be meted out to you and me for the next few days. If your spirits are liable to give way under it, you had better go home at once.”

“Count!” There was no mistaking the chagrin in the young man’s tone, and Cyril laughed encouragingly.

“That’s all right. I only wanted to prepare you for the worst. Well, shall we take a little stroll? If you are anxious to put my powers of prophecy to the proof, we might pay a few visits.”

The prospect of being turned from the doors of the persons visited did not commend itself to Mansfield, however, and Cyril and he strolled across the bridge and into the tree-shaded Neue Wiese or promenade. The stern regulations in vogue at Ludwigsbad permit an afternoon walk, but do not enforce it, and the gardens and the Königspark were not therefore crowded with Kurgäste, as would be the case a little later n the day. Still, there were a fair number of restless sufferers endeavouring to satisfy their consciences by a feverish activity in lounging up and down, or taking duty drives to points of interest, in company with the faithful relations who had attended them into exile, and Mansfield watched with a painful attention their demeanour towards his employer. He himself had arrived only the day before, and Cyril had carried him off almost immediately to an informal dinner-party at an open-air restaurant, where a little knot of men bearing historic names, and of women famous all over Europe for their beauty, had laughed and talked and jested, as they discussed the unappetising fare allowed them, like members of a very happy, simple-hearted, and united family. The novelty of the occasion had a little intoxicated him, and when the party broke up at nine o’clock it had needed a brisk walk along the Charlottenbad road, and an indulgence in thoughts of Philippa, such as he rarely allowed himself, to enable him to sleep at all. The unexpected friendliness of these great people had been astonishing enough, but it would be nothing compared with a sudden change to coolness, such as Cyril seemed to anticipate. Just as Mansfield, in his thoughts, had reached this point, he saw a carriage approaching in which sat the loveliest and friendliest of the ladies of the evening before. The Countess von Hohenthurm was a celebrated Pannonian beauty, and was commonly considered the haughtiest woman in the empire; but she had taken Mansfield under her wing at the dinner-party, explaining the half-veiled personal allusions with which the conversation was largely sprinkled, and confiding to him various indiscreet revelations respecting notable people then staying or expected at the baths. As she came towards him now, Mansfield raised his hand instinctively towards his hat, but Cyril’s voice at his side said, “Wait. It is possible that the lady has not the pleasure of your acquaintance.”

The idea seemed preposterous, for the Countess, in response to some remark made by the elderly lady who was driving with her, had turned her head in the direction of the two Englishmen, but there was no glance of recognition as her eyes met theirs. Without the movement of a muscle or the slightest change of colour, she looked through them both at the trees behind. It was beyond question that in the world of the Countess von Hohenthurm there existed no such persons as Count Mortimer and his secretary.

“Don’t look so utterly crushed,” said Cyril, giving Mansfield’s arm a gentle shake. “Didn’t I tell you how it would be?”

Mansfield walked on in silence, with compressed lips. Presently they met two of the gentlemen with whom they had dined, but these were so deeply engrossed in conversation as to be unable to recognise them. Next they passed a rustic seat, behind which rose a rock bearing an inscription to the effect that the Archduke Ferdinand Joachim desired to testify to the benefit he had derived from a course of the Ludwigsbad waters. Here there sat a hideous elderly man, of generous proportions, who was laying down the laws of fashion to two or three admiring disciples, with all the confidence to be expected in the recognised arbiter of taste at the baths. He also had been one of the guests of the night before, and Mansfield had conceived an instinctive dislike to him—a dislike which was not now lessened by his putting up an eyeglass, and wondering audibly, in terms of unnecessary emphasis, “Who those fellows might be that looked like Englishmen?”

“Well?” said Cyril, as they passed on; “was I a true prophet?”

“Yes; oh yes. But why—what does it all mean?”

“It means that they believe, or pretend to believe, that we are leagued with the Jews against them, and therefore, very naturally, they feel obliged to mark their disapproval of us.”

“But will it go on? How long will they keep it up?”

“Oh yes, it will go on, for exactly three days and a half. Remember that. Until then, I fear that you and I shall be confined to each other’s society. Pray talk as much as you like. I shall be delighted to listen.”

“I should like to say a word or two to that fellow,” muttered Mansfield, indicating by a backward glance the oracle of fashion.

“I earnestly hope you won’t. In the first place, he would not understand your German, and your righteous indignation would therefore be wasted. In the next, I would rather not kill him if I can help it.”

“Kill him? how?”

“With a sword, my dear youth. Excuse me, but you are really so refreshingly young. Is it beyond your powers of imagination to conceive that if you insulted him he would forthwith challenge me?”

“I can look after my own quarrels, Count,” very haughtily.

“In that case I should very soon have a funeral to look after in the British cemetery,” was the calm reply. “The man is a noted duellist, and you would be at his mercy in two minutes. With me as his antagonist, I will be conceited enough to say, things would be reversed. Since you are so kind as to propose to quarrel with him on my account, perhaps I may be allowed to intimate that I prefer a living secretary to a dead one.”

Mansfield, with an embarrassed laugh, yielded the point, although he did not succeed in arriving all at once at his employer’s pitch of philosophy. As they walked on, Cyril amused himself by detecting and commenting upon the shifts to which his acquaintances were reduced in order to escape seeing him. The ostracism was complete, and he pointed out to Mansfield that it must have been decreed only that morning—probably as soon as the Vindobona papers arrived. It so happened that there were no royal personages at the baths at present; but among the sojourners there was a large contingent of the Pannonian nobility, and it was from these, doubtless, that the fiat had gone forth which declared Count Mortimer to be from henceforth beyond the pale of society. A determined enemy, or even a mere busybody, could easily have found means to promulgate the news during those hours of the morning which were supposed to be devoted to rest, when authority had once spoken. It proved that no one was sufficiently courageous to disobey the edict but the officials of the place, who themselves saluted Cyril with an expression which said that this courtesy was not a reflection of their personal feelings, and that their sympathies were with his opponents. Matters were not improved on the arrival of the English papers, for it was discovered that the Vindobona journal which had done all the mischief had omitted one item of special interest in its quotation from the ‘Fleet Street Gazette.’ “The sudden collapse of the Hercynian opposition to Count Mortimer’s scheme,” wrote the correspondent at Czarigrad, “is thought here to be the result of the kind of business arrangement vulgarly known as a ‘deal.’ In other words, the Imperial Government has been bought off.” This was enough. The hatred always smouldering between the two Teutonic empires burst forth once more in the breasts of their representatives at Ludwigsbad, and the few Hercynians at the baths found themselves shunned almost as completely as Cyril, with whom their own convictions effectually forbade them to fraternise.

CHAPTER III.
IN SILVER SLIPPERS.

During the three days and a half anticipated by Cyril, he and his secretary remained under a ban, and moved about among the crowds of Kurgäste as little noticed as if they had been two invisible men, and almost as freely as if they had had Ludwigsbad to themselves. They were apparently unseen when, with their Bohemian glass tumblers suspended from their buttonholes, they joined the shivering throngs that surround in the early morning the kiosks from which the horrible healing waters are dispensed, and partook of their respective draughts, Cyril taking the proper eight glasses and Mansfield only one, purely for the sake of sociability. In the promenade which followed they met no one who was conscious of ever having seen them before; and when they had bought the regulation rolls and sat down to drink their coffee at a little table surrounded by scores of others, they were not only alone but unperceived in the crowd. In the afternoon they paid no visits and received none; and at dinner-time, when merry parties were formed round all the restaurant-tables, they sat down alone save for the company of the taciturn Thracian secretary Paschics, who seemed to be given over to perpetual mourning for the high position his employer had once held and lost. Not that their isolated condition made their table less gay than the rest. Cyril, always debonnaire and cheerful, exerted himself determinedly on these occasions to bring a smile to the melancholy countenance of Paschics, with the result that Mansfield became almost exhausted with laughing. The waiters hovered attentively in their neighbourhood, eager to catch a stray joke; and even the Kurdirektor, a very high and mighty autocrat indeed, found himself tempted by the peals of laughter to smoke a cigarette and partake of dessert in company with these victims of popular disapproval. One evening there was a dance after dinner at the Kursaal, and Cyril and Mansfield strolled in among the spectators, enjoying hugely the promptness with which way was made for them, as though they had been royal personages, or surrounded by an invisible but tangible fence. That is to say, Cyril enjoyed the experience frankly for its own sake, and Mansfield because he reflected that it was in Cyril’s cause he was undergoing it. Two years of fairly constant intercourse with Lady Philippa Mortimer had not tended to diminish his early veneration for her adored uncle, and there was also the further consolation for such hardship as his lot involved that she would regard it with sympathy—even with admiration.

The evenings on which there was no dancing were equally amusing in their way. Wandering through the shrubberies of the Königspark in the summer twilight, Cyril found himself accosted in sheltered corners first by one man and then by another who did not dare to dispute the general edict in public, but thought it might be advisable to remain friends with both sides under the rose. Naturally these people were not of the class or character with whom friendship was most desirable, being chiefly gentlemen who lived by their wits, with a sprinkling of Jews who believed that the Chevalier Goldberg had bought Cyril for their nation, and that this justified them in claiming his services for themselves, and it was a never-ending amusement to Mansfield to observe the adroitness with which Cyril snubbed them and dropped them promptly back into their proper places. There was one elderly capitalist who seemed to have been mildly coerced by the Chevalier into giving in his adhesion to the national movement, for on three separate occasions he pursued Cyril with a mournful persistence, endeavouring to persuade him that, since the masters of money throughout Europe were now for once united, it was folly to waste the force of such a combination on the mere acquisition of Palestine, when it might be used to establish a universal empire on a financial basis. The contrast between the frail, cringing figure of the old man, and his world-embracing schemes, was sufficiently ludicrous; but he stuck to his point until Cyril asked him what the hapless Jews scattered throughout Europe, on whom the popular fury would at once fall in case his plan was attempted, would think of him. Then he wrung his hands and made as though to rend his clothes, and departed sorrowful.

The three days mentioned by Cyril as the duration of the ostracism had elapsed; but when the usual visit to the springs was paid on the fourth morning, Mansfield noticed no change in the demeanour of the Kurgäste. People still looked over, round, and through the two Englishmen, and avoided carefully coming into the slightest personal contact with them as they stood waiting their turn to receive the hot and loathsome beverage. But when the unpleasant duty had been performed, and the drinkers turned away from the kiosk and into the promenade, the event occurred which Cyril had foreseen. Approaching the spring was a tall grey-bearded man of military appearance, walking with two others, who maintained their position a step behind him on either side, and to whom he turned and spoke occasionally. In the foreground, ranged in two lines and leaving an ample path for the new-comer, were all the most aristocratic of the Ludwigsbad visitors, bowing and curtseying with the deepest reverence as he reached them, and manifestly overjoyed when they received a personal greeting.

“The Emperor of Pannonia,” whispered Cyril to Mansfield. “Watch!”

How it happened Mansfield did not clearly see, since he was doing his best to copy the elaborate bows of the Pannonian magnates, but he was aware that the Emperor caught sight of Cyril, beckoned him forward, greeted him warmly, and requested him to turn and walk with him a short distance. Standing rather in the background, Mansfield was able to perceive and appreciate the expressions of astonishment and chagrin which chased one another over the countenances of the crowd that attended the Emperor, but he had little time to reflect upon their discomfiture, for a sign from Cyril warned him to fall into line with the two equerries, so that he could no longer observe the results of the Imperial condescension on the Emperor’s subjects. As for Cyril, he knew the reason of this friendly address, and had anticipated it. A Court scandal of a peculiarly unpleasant character had just been averted by means of the ready help of the Chevalier Goldberg. Not for the first time an archducal household had been established with the aid of the Chevalier’s money, and a secret threatening the honour of the Imperial house and the happiness of a young bride was safely locked up in the Chevalier’s breast. The Emperor was duly grateful, and having been informed of the connection between the Chevalier and Cyril, was doing honour to the one man by way of gratifying the other. He had, moreover, something to say also to Cyril himself.

“This Palestine scheme of yours, Count—I am glad to have the opportunity of speaking to you about it. Is there any prospect of your being successful?”

“I see no insuperable difficulty in our way at present, sir.”

“Well, I only hope you may succeed—as far as possible, that is—for there is no chance of getting rid of the whole body of Jews. The fewer that remain in Europe the more business will there be for those few, and I should fear that the emigrants will all come flocking back when they see how things are going. Still, you may relieve us of the lowest class of Jew for a time, at any rate, and that will do something to simplify our heart-breaking problems here. But before I can commend your scheme unreservedly, Count, I must be satisfied on one point of the utmost importance. You are aware that I number among my titles that of King of Jerusalem, and that two at least of my brother monarchs claim the right to do the same. We are hereditary guardians of the Holy Places, and you must see that it would not only be abhorrent to ourselves personally, but absolutely impossible, in view of the sentiment of Christendom, to place them in the power of the Jews.”

“That has been clearly foreseen, sir. It was the intention of the board whom I represent to request the Powers to nominate a Christian governor, who should make the Holy Places his chief care.”

“You make no suggestion as to the person to be nominated, Count?” The Emperor turned a keen glance upon Cyril.

“None, sir. It is obvious that the Prince to be chosen must be a man of liberal views, or he would fail to obtain the suffrages of all the Powers, but that is the only suggestion we could venture to offer. I suppose the governor would maintain order, as at present, by the aid of a Moslem guard; but it would be necessary to allow the Jews free access to the spots which they consider holy, and which they are now debarred from approaching. That proviso can hardly fail to commend itself to your Majesty as fair, I think?”

“It is only natural, and would affect no one but the Roumis, I imagine. Well, Count, you have relieved my mind. It will not surprise you to hear that urgent representations against your scheme have been made to me from several quarters, and without this very equitable proposal of yours I should have been forced to fall in with the views they expressed. Now, however, I am able to say that in my opinion you offer adequate protection for Christianity and the Holy Places, and I shall act accordingly. You are taking the waters here, I believe? I am glad to know you are at hand, in case I wish to consult you again on this subject.”

Thus graciously dismissed, Cyril mingled again with the crowd—a crowd that was now as anxious to propitiate as it had hitherto been to ignore him. During the next five minutes, three men, one of whom was the arbiter of fashion, asked him to dinner that night, and the Countess von Hohenthurm vouchsafed him the honour of carrying the paper bag containing her breakfast-roll. Tactless people complained of their bad eyesight, or lamented that they had not heard Count Mortimer was at the baths until this morning, but the tactful simply took up their acquaintance with him at the point where they had dropped it three days before. Cyril met their overtures in the same spirit, and his sole piece of revenge was to tell his entertainers at breakfast all the news of the last three days, as though they had only just arrived—a piece of pleasantry which brought to Mansfield’s face a passing gleam of satisfaction. Cyril took him to task for his lowering brow as they returned to the hotel, and told him that when the Countess von Hohenthurm was so condescending as to show an interest in a young man, it behoved that young man to be grateful, and to look it.

“They are all a set of sycophants!” returned Mansfield sharply. “How you can make friends of them again, I can’t imagine.”

“I don’t make friends of them, but they are fellow-members of society, and it would serve no good purpose to quarrel with them. If I was in their place, I should have acted precisely as they have done.”

“You won’t get me to believe that!” said Mansfield, with an air of mild reproof which Cyril found irresistibly comic.

“Why, how would you have had me mark my sense of their behaviour?” he asked.

“I don’t see how you can meet them again with any cordiality. Why not decline the honour of their further acquaintance?”

“Because we live in the great world, and not in Arcadia. You young people brought up virtuously in England have something terribly stagey about you. You are all for great coups, but that sort of thing doesn’t do in ordinary life. You remind me very much of my brother Caerleon as a young fellow. I don’t think I was ever so ineffably young myself. I hope not, at any rate. Melodrama is not good form.”

Much crushed by these remarks, which he received as a rebuke, Mansfield remained silent, and Cyril, observing this, administered a restorative as they entered the hotel.

“Never mind. I prefer you as you are. A little melodrama in private is rather amusing than otherwise, and in society you are a model of discretion, except as regards your looks. Those you must learn to control a little, but don’t think that I want you not to tell me what you think.”

He spoke rather absently, for the post had come in while they were out, and the table in his room was covered with letters and newspapers. He began at once to open the letters, while Mansfield turned to the papers and began his daily task of looking through them in search of any reference to the United Nation scheme.

“There is a very hostile article in this Scythian paper, Count,” he said after a time, looking round.

“Ah! what paper?”

“The ‘Pavelsburg Gazette.’”

“Good! then it’s inspired. Give me a rough translation, please.”

Mansfield was now accustomed to requests of this kind, and went through the article as rapidly as his somewhat imperfect knowledge of Scythian permitted. The writer was absolutely appalled by the news which had come from Czarigrad by way of England, and called upon all Christians to rise and prevent the proposed transfer of Palestine to Jewish hands. So sacrilegious an outrage could not be allowed to proceed, and it was the glorious privilege of the Emperor of Scythia, as head of the Orthodox Church and protector of the Holy Places, to prevent it. There was not a Scythian that would not give his life freely in such a cause, and the sooner the necessary steps were taken the better. It might be well even to proclaim a crusade, and end the Jewish difficulty at one blow by sweeping the whole of the accursed race from the earth.

“Very pretty!” said Cyril, “and evidently meant to prepare the way for effective action. Scythia has already sounded the other Powers, no doubt; I thought as much from what the Emperor said to me just now. Well, I have put a spoke in her wheel, I fancy. When she finds there is nothing to be done in that direction, she will proceed to push matters to extremities at Czarigrad, and then comes the tug of war.”

“But can you hope to put sufficient backbone into the Grand Seignior to enable Roum to stand up against her?” asked Mansfield, surprised by the confident tone.

“No, that would be beyond the wit of man, but I intend to put a little gentle pressure on Scythia instead.”

“Would it spoil your plans if you told me how you intend to do it? I can’t imagine how you will manage.”

Cyril smiled pleasantly. “There is a famine in Scythia at this moment,” he said; “so much you know already. You know also that it must be pretty bad for the Scythian papers to be allowed to acknowledge its existence at all. There is also a rising in Central Asia that looks threatening. The sufferers from the famine must be helped, and the rising must be put down, but where is the money to come from? Such hoards as the peasantry may have amassed in good years are exhausted by this time, and there are no Jews left in the rural districts to borrow from. The Government will have to step in, but though the war-chest is full, its contents must be kept intact in view of a possible European war, and there is very little money in the country otherwise. To improve matters, certain shrewd gentlemen in America have arranged a corner in cereals, with a special eye to this famine and the consequent demand. Now do you see where we come in, when it becomes evident that there is no money to be obtained in all Europe if our scheme is thwarted at Czarigrad?”

“You mean to starve them out?” said Mansfield, with more than a touch of horror in his tone.

“By no means. We take our pound of flesh, which is Palestine, that’s all.”

“What a queer-looking old chap that is over there, Count!” said Mansfield to Cyril, as they were taking their walk one morning about a week after the Emperor’s arrival. “He might be a stage brigand.”

Cyril glanced in the direction he indicated. “Why, that is my venerable friend Prince Mirkovics!” he cried. “Who would ever have dreamt of meeting him here? I thought he never left Thracia.”

He crossed the promenade with a rapid step, and accosted the old man whose truculent air and fierce white moustache had attracted Mansfield’s attention. The garb of civilisation sat awkwardly upon Prince Mirkovics, and it was obvious that he felt ill at ease without the pistols and dagger which adorned his girdle when in Thracian costume; but the scornful frown with which he had been contemplating the vanities of Ludwigsbad vanished when he caught sight of Cyril, whom he greeted with beaming smiles.

“I will join you in your walk, Count, if you will allow me,” he said, when Mansfield had been duly introduced to him. “I have a good deal to tell you.”

“Two years’ Thracian news!” said Cyril lightly. “I have avoided hearing or reading anything of the kind, on principle, since I left Thracia, but I felt all the time that it was only accumulating, to overwhelm me some day.”

“His Excellency loves to jest,” remarked Prince Mirkovics solemnly to Mansfield. “Perhaps,” he added, turning again to Cyril, “you are not even aware that his Majesty intends to visit Ludwigsbad? I believe he was to arrive to-day.”

“What, King Michael?” cried Cyril. “No, I had not heard it. Why, Mr Mansfield, how is this? It’s your business to keep me posted up in the names of the expected arrivals. Oh, is that it?” as Mansfield began a stammering defence; “you thought it might call up unpleasant memories, and therefore you left me to meet him unawares? I am not quite so sensitive as that, you know, and you needn’t be so very anxious to spare my feelings.”

“The Princess of Dardania is naturally coming as well,” continued Prince Mirkovics.

“Surely not? Why, her husband has only been dead for ten or twelve months. She is far too clever to outrage propriety by coming to such a place as this so soon.”

“She does not dare to stay away, Count. The quarrel with her eldest son has forced her to quit Dardania, and the coolness which came to a head before that between herself and her elder daughter closes Mœsia to her. Thracia is her only hope, for if King Michael should break his promise to marry the Princess Ludmilla, she would be discredited on all sides.”

Cyril’s eyes flashed ominously. “Then her Nemesis has overtaken her already?” he said.

“It has, Count, at least so far as regards the marriage project which threw you out of office. Her Royal Highness is a clever woman, but she has so much at stake in this affair that she has failed to show her customary tact. She has kept too tight a hand over young Michael, made the chain by which she has bound him to her daughter too evident, and if he could muster sufficient courage, he would break it. He slipped away from Thracia without her knowledge, well aware that she would oppose his coming here, and she, her daughter, and her household, are following him promptly. But everything will be done with propriety, my dear Count. She has borrowed the Grand-Duke Eugen’s villa, and will receive none but relations.”

“Still, the proceeding sounds a little undignified,” said Cyril drily.

“So much the better, Count, provided it fails. That woman is the curse of Thracia. Since you left us she has filled the Ministry, the army, and the civil service with Scythian sympathisers—for Drakovics, in his second childhood, is nothing but her tool—with the result that we are now bankrupt in all but name.”

“Bankrupt? and I left the treasury full!”

“Bankrupt. Such changes cost money, Count, both for rewarding friends and bribing foes. The King, again—he is a young gentleman of taste, and must spend liberally on his pleasures. The increase of the army—we could approve of that, for he is Otto Georg’s son, and should be a born soldier. The beautifying of the capital and the construction of needless public works—well, it provides employment for the proletariat, and no doubt he has inherited his mother’s charitable disposition. But when it comes to squandering money upon theatres and pictures, and subsidising musicians and dubious foreigners of all sorts—then, Count, we remember that he is the grandson of Luitpold of Weldart, and we tremble.”

“And does the Princess approve of these artistic pleasures?”

“By no means, Count; but she cannot persuade his Majesty to relinquish them, and since his mother left Thracia there is no one else who can even pretend to influence him.”

“But what a shameful thing for the Queen to leave Thracia when she had allowed her son to bring all this trouble upon the kingdom!” broke in Mansfield, who had imbibed from Lady Philippa an inveterate dislike of the woman whom she regarded as her uncle’s evil genius. “What has she done with herself?”

“Young man,” said Prince Mirkovics severely, “her Majesty was deeply affected by the unhappy events which drove Count Mortimer from Thracia. Her uncontrollable grief reflected so severely upon her son and the Princess of Dardania, that they proposed to place her in seclusion, alleging that she suffered from delusions. Warned in time, the Queen succeeded in escaping from the kingdom, accompanied by several faithful members of her household. From Czarigrad, where she took refuge, she made terms with her son, who agreed to pay her jointure without protest if she withdrew altogether from politics in future. Her Majesty then retired to a community of Protestant nuns on Mount Lebanon, where she occupies herself in good works and in bewailing the past. My daughter is one of those who share her exile, gladly devoting their lives to the service of their unfortunate mistress. Count Mortimer knows that I disliked the Queen’s being appointed regent, but nothing can excuse King Michael’s conduct to his mother.”

Cyril had remained silent while Prince Mirkovics spoke. His face was very pale, and it was with evident difficulty that he said—

“Have you no remedy to propose for the state of things in Thracia, Prince?”

“I have; but it is a drastic one. You wonder, perhaps, to see me here? Do you know that I am on my way home from England—I who have never left Thracia before? I visited your brother, to inquire whether there was any hope of his returning to the throne in this extremity.”

“My dear Prince!”

“How are we better off than when we were under the house of Franza, Count? Your brother came to our help then, but he refuses now.”

“And quite right, too. Accepting the offer of a vacant throne is a very different thing from annexing an occupied one.”

“Well, Count, we turn to you. Will you return to Thracia as Prime Minister? The country is on our side, and we propose to set before the King the alternatives of accepting you as Premier or as Regent. The Constitution makes provision for such an appointment in case of the incurable extravagance or deliberate viciousness of the monarch.”

“Pray speak lower, Prince. You are talking treason, and in Ludwigsbad the very rocks have ears. No; I cannot come. I have other work on hand.”

“You are doing something for the Jews. Oh, throw them over.”

“Not in favour of Thracia, at any rate. Thracia had me once, and resigned me with quite unnecessary willingness. Now she may want me, but she can’t have me. The punishment is deserved.”

“But for our sakes, Count—your friends?”

“No, Prince, I am not up to it. I gave the best part of my life to building up a workable and fairly honest system of government, and two years have been enough to reduce it to chaos. I could not submit to the years of weary office drudgery over again. New work I can take up and carry through; but I have lost the patience and elasticity I used to possess, and I will not fail where I succeeded once.”

CHAPTER IV.
A DISTURBING ELEMENT.

The bitter words in which Cyril renounced all interest in Thracia were interrupted by an exclamation from Mansfield, who was staring incredulously at a little party of people approaching from one of the winding paths. There were an old lady in a bath-chair, a girl, and a young man, the last two unmistakably English.

“Don’t you see, Count? It’s Lady Phil and Usk!” cried Mansfield, quickening his steps; but Cyril caught him by the arm.

“Wait a minute, Mansfield. Did my brother stipulate that you were not to speak to Lady Phil during this year of probation? If he did, I will curb my natural longing to see my niece, and we will turn our backs upon danger.”

“Oh, no, really!” Mansfield was horror-struck by the suggestion. “I was not to follow her about; but I was never forbidden to speak to her if we met. Lord Caerleon trusted me, I am sure.”

“Caerleon was always trustful,” said Cyril unkindly; but he consented to keep pace with Mansfield’s hurrying feet, and was considerate enough to allow the young people to greet one another apart, while he presented Prince Mirkovics in due form to Princess Soudaroff, an exiled Scythian lady who occupied the position of godmother to both the Marchioness of Caerleon and her daughter. Had the matter rested with him, he would have left them to themselves for a longer time, but Prince Mirkovics, who was standing with his hat in his hand, looked at him reproachfully.

“Alas, Count! am I not to enjoy the honour of being presented also to Madame your niece?”

“Prince Mirkovics accords you royal honours, Phil,” said Cyril. “Is it necessary to mention that Lady Philippa is Lord Caerleon’s daughter, Prince?”

“Quite unnecessary, Count. Madame must not come to Thracia unless she comes as queen. There are still old men who remember her father’s reign, and it goes without saying that all the young men would be ready to champion the cause of such a lady.”

“I’m so glad you think me like my father,” said Philippa, in her old impulsive way. “But even if he was still King of Thracia, I shouldn’t be of any importance, you know. Usk would be the great person, not I.”

Prince Mirkovics glanced at the slight dark-haired youth whose mirthful grey eyes met his across the bath-chair, and shook his head.

“No, madame, Milord Usk resembles your mother too much. She was a beautiful girl, indeed—I remember seeing her at the municipal ball given in honour of your father’s arrival at Bellaviste—but to us she is only the woman for whose sake Carlino forsook Thracia.”

“What a horrid way of putting it!” cried Philippa. “You ought to be thankful that I’m not a princess, for I should get you banished from Court for saying such things. Uncle Cyril, I am sure we ought not to keep Prince Mirkovics standing here so long.”

She glanced entreatingly at her uncle, for Prince Mirkovics still maintained his deferential attitude, hat in hand, and Cyril came to the rescue. “My niece is afraid you will take cold, Prince. Pray put on your hat.”

“May I be permitted to attend Madame for a short distance?” asked the old man, complying immediately with the request, and Cyril, much amused, accepted the humbler office of walking beside the bath-chair, while Mansfield, looking extremely disconsolate, attached himself to Usk.

“Ah, Princess, this is your doing!” said Cyril to the old lady. “You are certainly an inveterate match-maker. I never knew any one like you.”

“Why, what have I done?” asked Princess Soudaroff, with great simplicity. “I thought the Ludwigsbad waters might do me good, and therefore I came here. Could I leave Phil and her brother behind, when their parents had entrusted them to my care?”

“Perhaps you had heard that the Ludwigsbad water is meat and drink in one, and thought you might economise, eh, Princess? Have you been spending your whole year’s income in advance on your charities, as usual?”

“No, no. The fact is, poor Phil seemed so painfully interested in Ludwigsbad and your letters, that I thought the waters would—would do me no harm, and so we are here.”

“The truth at last, Princess! Confession is good for the soul.”

“I like the look of the young man,” remarked the Princess confidentially. “Of course I have heard a great deal about him already from Usk, but I was anxious to see him. And he is your secretary, Lord Cyril? And you are engaged in bringing about the restoration of the Jews to their own land? What a wonderful age this is of ours, and what a privilege for you to be allowed to assist in such a work! I can’t tell you how thankful it makes me that I have been allowed to live long enough to witness this crowning fulfilment of prophecy.”

“I must introduce my friend Goldberg to you if he comes here,” said Cyril. “You and he both take that view of things.”

“I have already had some correspondence with the Chevalier Goldberg on the subject of relief for the Scythian Jews. Ah, how sad it is that my own country should take the lead in ill-treating God’s ancient people! Is it true that Scythia is even now resisting your measures for releasing them from bondage?”

“Scythia is undoubtedly doing her best to spoil our plans at Czarigrad.”

“Lord Cyril, a thought has struck me.” The old lady sat upright suddenly. “I am expecting Vladimir Alexandrovitch here in a day or two. You know that he manages my affairs, and is anxious to consult me about some investment. When I told him I should be at Ludwigsbad, he said that would suit him quite well.”

“Prince Soudaroff is coming here?”

“Yes, merely on this business of mine, as I said. But he is an honourable, fair-minded man. Why should you not meet him informally and talk things over? You could put the case for the Jews fully before him—men in his position are always surrounded by people whose interest it is to keep the truth from them—and I am sure he would be convinced. Then he could represent the real state of affairs to the Emperor. You won’t refuse to make the attempt? It may save so much delay.”

“I shall be delighted to meet Prince Soudaroff whenever you like, Princess.” But in his own mind Cyril was using very different language regarding the prospective visit of the great diplomatist who was so fortunate as to be brother-in-law to the unsuspicious old lady in the bath-chair.

“Then they have felt the pinch already? This is sharp work. Wily idea to cloak the object of Soudaroff’s journey in this way. But I shall have to walk warily, for it’s no joke to find oneself between him and her most sapient Highness of Dardania.”

They had arrived at the bridge between the old and new promenades, and he seized the opportunity to detach Prince Mirkovics from Philippa, and carry him off to his rooms, earning Mansfield’s undying gratitude by deputing him to escort the ladies back to their lodgings—a gratitude which was immediately extended to the Princess when she remarked that it would be pleasant to take a turn in the Neue Wiese before returning.

“Do you know,” said Philippa mysteriously, as she resumed her place beside the chair, while Mansfield unblushingly deserted Usk in order to walk with her, “I think that poor old man must be a little queer. He has been going on in the most extraordinary way, saying that I ought to be a queen, and trying to make me discontented with my humble lot in life. I told him I was perfectly happy in it, and then he said that I had inherited my father’s only fault, lack of ambition, and that if father and Uncle Cyril could be mixed up together, they would make a perfect king. I told him that I thought Uncle Cyril was splendid, but that I wouldn’t have father the least bit different for anything, and he said that only confirmed what he had remarked before.”

“He evidently thinks it’s your duty to worry father back to Thracia,” laughed Usk.

“Awfully lucky for me that you don’t agree with him,” said Mansfield. “I should never have had a chance of coming across you in that case.”

The Kings of the East: A Romance of the Near Future

THE KINGSOF THE EAST

CONTENTS.