THE LOST PRINCE by Francis Hodgson Burnett

THE LOST PRINCE
Francis Hodgson Burnett
CONTENTS
I The New Lodgers at No. 7 Philibert Place
II A Young Citizen of the World
III The Legend of the Lost Prince
IV The Rat
V ``Silence Is Still the Order''
VI The Drill and the Secret Party
VII ``The Lamp Is Lighted!''
VIII An Exciting Game
IX ``It Is Not a Game''
X The Rat-and Samavia
XI Come with Me
XII Only Two Boys
XIII Loristan Attends a Drill of the Squad
XIV Marco Does Not Answer
XV A Sound in a Dream
XVI The Rat to the Rescue
XVII ``It Is a Very Bad Sign''
XVIII ``Cities and Faces''
XIX ``That Is One!''
XX Marco Goes to the Opera
XXI ``Help!''
XXII A Night Vigil
XXIII The Silver Horn
XXIV ``How Shall We Find Him?
XXV A Voice in the Night
XXVI Across the Frontier
XXVII ``It is the Lost Prince! It Is Ivor!''
XXVIII ``Extra! Extra! Extra!''
XXIX 'Twixt Night and Morning
XXX The Game Is at an End
XXXI ``The Son of Stefan Loristan''
THE LOST PRINCE
I
THE NEW LODGERS AT NO. 7 PHILIBERT PLACE
There are many dreary and dingy rows of ugly houses in certain
parts of London, but there certainly could not be any row more
ugly or dingier than Philibert Place. There were stories that it
had once been more attractive, but that had been so long ago that
no one remembered the time. It stood back in its gloomy, narrow
strips of uncared-for, smoky gardens, whose broken iron railings
were supposed to protect it from the surging traffic of a road
which was always roaring with the rattle of busses, cabs, drays,
and vans, and the passing of people who were shabbily dressed and
looked as if they were either going to hard work or coming from
it, or hurrying to see if they could find some of it to do to
keep themselves from going hungry. The brick fronts of the
houses were blackened with smoke, their windows were nearly all
dirty and hung with dingy curtains, or had no curtains at all;
the strips of ground, which had once been intended to grow
flowers in, had been trodden down into bare earth in which even
weeds had forgotten to grow. One of them was used as a
stone-cutter's yard, and cheap monuments, crosses, and slates
were set out for sale, bearing inscriptions beginning with
``Sacred to the Memory of.'' Another had piles of old lumber in
it, another exhibited second-hand furniture, chairs with unsteady
legs, sofas with horsehair stuffing bulging out of holes in their
covering, mirrors with blotches or cracks in them. The insides
of the houses were as gloomy as the outside. They were all
exactly alike. In each a dark entrance passage led to narrow
stairs going up to bedrooms, and to narrow steps going down to a
basement kitchen. The back bedroom looked out on small, sooty,
flagged yards, where thin cats quarreled, or sat on the coping of
the brick walls hoping that sometime they might feel the sun; the
front rooms looked over the noisy road, and through their windows
came the roar and rattle of it. It was shabby and cheerless on
the brightest days, and on foggy or rainy ones it was the most
forlorn place in London.
At least that was what one boy thought as he stood near the iron
railings watching the passers-by on the morning on which this
story begins, which was also the morning after he had been
brought by his father to live as a lodger in the back
sitting-room of the house No. 7.
He was a boy about twelve years old, his name was Marco Loristan,
and he was the kind of boy people look at a second time when they
have looked at him once. In the first place, he was a very big
boy--tall for his years, and with a particularly strong frame.
His shoulders were broad and his arms and legs were long and
powerful. He was quite used to hearing people say, as they
glanced at him, ``What a fine, big lad!'' And then they always
looked again at his face. It was not an English face or an
American one, and was very dark in coloring. His features were
strong, his black hair grew on his head like a mat, his eyes were
large and deep set, and looked out between thick, straight, black
lashes. He was as un- English a boy as one could imagine, and an
observing person would have been struck at once by a sort of
SILENT look expressed by his whole face, a look which suggested
that he was not a boy who talked much.
This look was specially noticeable this morning as he stood
before the iron railings. The things he was thinking of were of
a kind likely to bring to the face of a twelve-year-old boy an
unboyish expression.
He was thinking of the long, hurried journey he and his father
and their old soldier servant, Lazarus, had made during the last
few days--the journey from Russia. Cramped in a close
third-class railway carriage, they had dashed across the
Continent as if something important or terrible were driving
them, and here they were, settled in London as if they were going
to live forever at No. 7 Philibert Place. He knew, however, that
though they might stay a year, it was just as probable that, in
the middle of some night, his father or Lazarus might waken him
from his sleep and say, ``Get up-- dress yourself quickly. We
must go at once.'' A few days later, he might be in St.
Petersburg, Berlin, Vienna, or Budapest, huddled away in some
poor little house as shabby and comfortless as No. 7 Philibert
Place.
He passed his hand over his forehead as he thought of it and
watched the busses. His strange life and his close association
with his father had made him much older than his years, but he
was only a boy, after all, and the mystery of things sometimes
weighed heavily upon him, and set him to deep wondering.
In not one of the many countries he knew had he ever met a boy
whose life was in the least like his own. Other boys had homes
in which they spent year after year; they went to school
regularly, and played with other boys, and talked openly of the
things which happened to them, and the journeys they made. When
he remained in a place long enough to make a few boy-friends, he
knew he must never forget that his whole existence was a sort of
secret whose safety depended upon his own silence and discretion.
This was because of the promises he had made to his father, and
they had been the first thing he remembered. Not that he had
ever regretted anything connected with his father. He threw his
black head up as he thought of that. None of the other boys had
such a father, not one of them. His father was his idol and his
chief. He had scarcely ever seen him when his clothes had not
been poor and shabby, but he had also never seen him when,
despite his worn coat and frayed linen, he had not stood out
among all others as more distinguished than the most noticeable
of them. When he walked down a street, people turned to look at
him even oftener than they turned to look at Marco, and the boy
felt as if it was not merely because he was a big man with a
handsome, dark face, but because he looked, somehow, as if he had
been born to command armies, and as if no one would think of
disobeying him. Yet Marco had never seen him command any one,
and they had always been poor, and shabbily dressed, and often
enough ill-fed. But whether they were in one country or another,
and whatsoever dark place they seemed to be hiding in, the few
people they saw treated him with a sort of deference, and nearly
always stood when they were in his presence, unless he bade them
sit down.
``It is because they know he is a patriot, and patriots are
respected,'' the boy had told himself.
He himself wished to be a patriot, though he had never seen his
own country of Samavia. He knew it well, however. His father
had talked to him about it ever since that day when he had made
the promises. He had taught him to know it by helping him to
study curious detailed maps of it--maps of its cities, maps of
its mountains, maps of its roads. He had told him stories of the
wrongs done its people, of their sufferings and struggles for
liberty, and, above all, of their unconquerable courage. When
they talked together of its history, Marco's boy-blood burned and
leaped in his veins, and he always knew, by the look in his
father's eyes, that his blood burned also. His countrymen had
been killed, they had been robbed, they had died by thousands of
cruelties and starvation, but their souls had never been
conquered, and, through all the years during which more powerful
nations crushed and enslaved them, they never ceased to struggle
to free themselves and stand unfettered as Samavians had stood
centuries before.
``Why do we not live there,'' Marco had cried on the day the
promises were made. ``Why do we not go back and fight? When I
am a man, I will be a soldier and die for Samavia.''
``We are of those who must LIVE for Samavia--working day and
night,'' his father had answered; ``denying ourselves, training
our bodies and souls, using our brains, learning the things which
are best to be done for our people and our country. Even exiles
may be Samavian soldiers--I am one, you must be one.''
``Are we exiles?'' asked Marco.
``Yes,'' was the answer. ``But even if we never set foot on
Samavian soil, we must give our lives to it. I have given mine
since I was sixteen. I shall give it until I die.''
``Have you never lived there?'' said Marco.
A strange look shot across his father's face.
``No,'' he answered, and said no more. Marco watching him, knew
he must not ask the question again.
The next words his father said were about the promises. Marco
was quite a little fellow at the time, but he understood the
solemnity of them, and felt that he was being honored as if he
were a man.
``When you are a man, you shall know all you wish to know,''
Loristan said. ``Now you are a child, and your mind must not be
burdened. But you must do your part. A child sometimes forgets
that words may be dangerous. You must promise never to forget
this. Wheresoever you are; if you have playmates, you must
remember to be silent about many things. You must not speak of
what I do, or of the people who come to see me. You must not
mention the things in your life which make it different from the
lives of other boys. You must keep in your mind that a secret
exists which a chance foolish word might betray. You are a
Samavian, and there have been Samavians who have died a thousand
deaths rather than betray a secret. You must learn to obey
without question, as if you were a soldier. Now you must take
your oath of allegiance.''
He rose from his seat and went to a corner of the room. He knelt
down, turned back the carpet, lifted a plank, and took something
from beneath it. It was a sword, and, as he came back to Marco,
he drew it out from its sheath. The child's strong, little body
stiffened and drew itself up, his large, deep eyes flashed. He
was to take his oath of allegiance upon a sword as if he were a
man. He did not know that his small hand opened and shut with a
fierce understanding grip because those of his blood had for long
centuries past carried swords and fought with them.
Loristan gave him the big bared weapon, and stood erect before
him.
``Repeat these words after me sentence by sentence!'' he
commanded.
And as he spoke them Marco echoed each one loudly and clearly.
``The sword in my hand--for Samavia!
``The heart in my breast--for Samavia!
``The swiftness of my sight, the thought of my brain, the life of
my life--for Samavia.
``Here grows a man for Samavia.
``God be thanked!''
Then Loristan put his hand on the child's shoulder, and his dark
face looked almost fiercely proud.
``From this hour,'' he said, ``you and I are comrades at arms.''
And from that day to the one on which he stood beside the broken
iron railings of No. 7 Philibert Place, Marco had not forgotten
for one hour.
II
A YOUNG CITIZEN OF THE WORLD
He had been in London more than once before, but not to the
lodgings in Philibert Place. When he was brought a second or
third time to a town or city, he always knew that the house he
was taken to would be in a quarter new to him, and he should not
see again the people he had seen before. Such slight links of
acquaintance as sometimes formed themselves between him and other
children as shabby and poor as himself were easily broken. His
father, however, had never forbidden him to make chance
acquaintances. He had, in fact, told him that he had reasons for
not wishing him to hold himself aloof from other boys. The only
barrier which must exist between them must be the barrier of
silence concerning his wanderings from country to country. Other
boys as poor as he was did not make constant journeys, therefore
they would miss nothing from his boyish talk when he omitted all
mention of his. When he was in Russia, he must speak only of
Russian places and Russian people and customs. When he was in
France, Germany, Austria, or England, he must do the same thing.
When he had learned English, French, German, Italian, and Russian
he did not know. He had seemed to grow up in the midst of
changing tongues which all seemed familiar to him, as languages
are familiar to children who have lived with them until one
scarcely seems less familiar than another. He did remember,
however, that his father had always been unswerving in his
attention to his pronunciation and method of speaking the
language of any country they chanced to be living in.
``You must not seem a foreigner in any country,'' he had said to
him. ``It is necessary that you should not. But when you are in
England, you must not know French, or German, or anything but
English.''
Once, when he was seven or eight years old, a boy had asked him
what his father's work was.
``His own father is a carpenter, and he asked me if my father was
one,'' Marco brought the story to Loristan. ``I said you were
not. Then he asked if you were a shoemaker, and another one said
you might be a bricklayer or a tailor--and I didn't know what to
tell them.'' He had been out playing in a London street, and he
put a grubby little hand on his father's arm, and clutched and
almost fiercely shook it. ``I wanted to say that you were not
like their fathers, not at all. I knew you were not, though you
were quite as poor. You are not a bricklayer or a shoemaker, but
a patriot--you could not be only a bricklayer--you!'' He said it
grandly and with a queer indignation, his black head held up and
his eyes angry.
Loristan laid his hand against his mouth.
``Hush! hush!'' he said. ``Is it an insult to a man to think he
may be a carpenter or make a good suit of clothes? If I could
make our clothes, we should go better dressed. If I were a
shoemaker, your toes would not be making their way into the world
as they are now.'' He was smiling, but Marco saw his head held
itself high, too, and his eyes were glowing as he touched his
shoulder. ``I know you did not tell them I was a patriot,'' he
ended. ``What was it you said to them?''
``I remembered that you were nearly always writing and drawing
maps, and I said you were a writer, but I did not know what you
wrote--and that you said it was a poor trade. I heard you say
that once to Lazarus. Was that a right thing to tell them?''
``Yes. You may always say it if you are asked. There are poor
fellows enough who write a thousand different things which bring
them little money. There is nothing strange in my being a
writer.''
So Loristan answered him, and from that time if, by any chance,
his father's means of livelihood were inquired into, it was
simple enough and true enough to say that he wrote to earn his
bread.
In the first days of strangeness to a new place, Marco often
walked a great deal. He was strong and untiring, and it amused
him to wander through unknown streets, and look at shops, and
houses, and people. He did not confine himself to the great
thoroughfares, but liked to branch off into the side streets and
odd, deserted-looking squares, and even courts and alleyways. He
often stopped to watch workmen and talk to them if they were
friendly. In this way he made stray acquaintances in his
strollings, and learned a good many things. He had a fondness
for wandering musicians, and, from an old Italian who had in his
youth been a singer in opera, he had learned to sing a number of
songs in his strong, musical boy-voice. He knew well many of the
songs of the people in several countries.
It was very dull this first morning, and he wished that he had
something to do or some one to speak to. To do nothing whatever
is a depressing thing at all times, but perhaps it is more
especially so when one is a big, healthy boy twelve years old.
London as he saw it in the Marylebone Road seemed to him a
hideous place. It was murky and shabby-looking, and full of
dreary-faced people. It was not the first time he had seen the
same things, and they always made him feel that he wished he had
something to do.
Suddenly he turned away from the gate and went into the house to
speak to Lazarus. He found him in his dingy closet of a room on
the fourth floor at the back of the house.
``I am going for a walk,'' he announced to him. ``Please tell my
father if he asks for me. He is busy, and I must not disturb
him.''
Lazarus was patching an old coat as he often patched things--
even shoes sometimes. When Marco spoke, he stood up at once to
answer him. He was very obstinate and particular about certain
forms of manner. Nothing would have obliged him to remain seated
when Loristan or Marco was near him. Marco thought it was
because he had been so strictly trained as a soldier. He knew
that his father had had great trouble to make him lay aside his
habit of saluting when they spoke to him.
``Perhaps,'' Marco had heard Loristan say to him almost severely,
once when he had forgotten himself and had stood at salute while
his master passed through a broken-down iron gate before an
equally broken-down-looking lodging-house--``perhaps you can
force yourself to remember when I tell you that it is not
safe--IT IS NOT SAFE! You put us in danger!''
It was evident that this helped the good fellow to control
himself. Marco remembered that at the time he had actually
turned pale, and had struck his forehead and poured forth a
torrent of Samavian dialect in penitence and terror. But, though
he no longer saluted them in public, he omitted no other form of
reverence and ceremony, and the boy had become accustomed to
being treated as if he were anything but the shabby lad whose
very coat was patched by the old soldier who stood ``at
attention'' before him.
``Yes, sir,'' Lazarus answered. ``Where was it your wish to
go?''
Marco knitted his black brows a little in trying to recall
distinct memories of the last time he had been in London.
``I have been to so many places, and have seen so many things
since I was here before, that I must begin to learn again about
the streets and buildings I do not quite remember.''
``Yes, sir,'' said Lazarus. ``There HAVE been so many. I also
forget. You were but eight years old when you were last here.''
``I think I will go and find the royal palace, and then I will
walk about and learn the names of the streets,'' Marco said.
``Yes, sir,'' answered Lazarus, and this time he made his
military salute.
Marco lifted his right hand in recognition, as if he had been a
young officer. Most boys might have looked awkward or theatrical
in making the gesture, but he made it with naturalness and ease,
because he had been familiar with the form since his babyhood.
He had seen officers returning the salutes of their men when they
encountered each other by chance in the streets, he had seen
princes passing sentries on their way to their carriages, more
august personages raising the quiet, recognizing hand to their
helmets as they rode through applauding crowds. He had seen many
royal persons and many royal pageants, but always only as an
ill-clad boy standing on the edge of the crowd of common people.
An energetic lad, however poor, cannot spend his days in going
from one country to another without, by mere every-day chance,
becoming familiar with the outer life of royalties and courts.
Marco had stood in continental thoroughfares when visiting
emperors rode by with glittering soldiery before and behind them,
and a populace shouting courteous welcomes. He knew where in
various great capitals the sentries stood before kingly or
princely palaces. He had seen certain royal faces often enough
to know them well, and to be ready to make his salute when
particular quiet and unattended carriages passed him by.
``It is well to know them. It is well to observe everything and
to train one's self to remember faces and circumstances,'' his
father had said. ``If you were a young prince or a young man
training for a diplomatic career, you would be taught to notice
and remember people and things as you would be taught to speak
your own language with elegance. Such observation would be your
most practical accomplishment and greatest power. It is as
practical for one man as another--for a poor lad in a patched
coat as for one whose place is to be in courts. As you cannot be
educated in the ordinary way, you must learn from travel and the
world. You must lose nothing--forget nothing.''
It was his father who had taught him everything, and he had
learned a great deal. Loristan had the power of making all
things interesting to fascination. To Marco it seemed that he
knew everything in the world. They were not rich enough to buy
many books, but Loristan knew the treasures of all great cities,
the resources of the smallest towns. Together he and his boy
walked through the endless galleries filled with the wonders of
the world, the pictures before which through centuries an
unbroken procession of almost worshiping eyes had passed
uplifted. Because his father made the pictures seem the glowing,
burning work of still-living men whom the centuries could not
turn to dust, because he could tell the stories of their living
and laboring to triumph, stories of what they felt and suffered
and were, the boy became as familiar with the old
masters--Italian, German, French, Dutch, English, Spanish--as he
was with most of the countries they had lived in. They were not
merely old masters to him, but men who were great, men who seemed
to him to have wielded beautiful swords and held high, splendid
lights. His father could not go often with him, but he always
took him for the first time to the galleries, museums, libraries,
and historical places which were richest in treasures of art,
beauty, or story. Then, having seen them once through his eyes,
Marco went again and again alone, and so grew intimate with the
wonders of the world. He knew that he was gratifying a wish of
his father's when he tried to train himself to observe all things
and forget nothing. These palaces of marvels were his
school-rooms, and his strange but rich education was the most
interesting part of his life. In time, he knew exactly the
places where the great Rembrandts, Vandykes, Rubens, Raphaels,
Tintorettos, or Frans Hals hung; he knew whether this masterpiece
or that was in Vienna, in Paris, in Venice, or Munich, or Rome.
He knew stories of splendid crown jewels, of old armor, of
ancient crafts, and of Roman relics dug up from beneath the
foundations of old German cities. Any boy wandering to amuse
himself through museums and palaces on ``free days'' could see
what he saw, but boys living fuller and less lonely lives would
have been less likely to concentrate their entire minds on what
they looked at, and also less likely to store away facts with the
determination to be able to recall at any moment the mental shelf
on which they were laid. Having no playmates and nothing to play
with, he began when he was a very little fellow to make a sort of
game out of his rambles through picture-galleries, and the places
which, whether they called themselves museums or not, were
storehouses or relics of antiquity. There were always the
blessed ``free days,'' when he could climb any marble steps, and
enter any great portal without paying an entrance fee. Once
inside, there were plenty of plainly and poorly dressed people to
be seen, but there were not often boys as young as himself who
were not attended by older companions. Quiet and orderly as he
was, he often found himself stared at. The game he had created
for himself was as simple as it was absorbing. It was to try how
much he could remember and clearly describe to his father when
they sat together at night and talked of what he had seen. These
night talks filled his happiest hours. He never felt lonely
then, and when his father sat and watched him with a certain
curious and deep attention in his dark, reflective eyes, the boy
was utterly comforted and content. Sometimes he brought back
rough and crude sketches of objects he wished to ask questions
about, and Loristan could always relate to him the full, rich
story of the thing he wanted to know. They were stories made so
splendid and full of color in the telling that Marco could not
forget them.
III
THE LEGEND OF THE LOST PRINCE
As he walked through the streets, he was thinking of one of these
stories. It was one he had heard first when he was very young,
and it had so seized upon his imagination that he had asked often
for it. It was, indeed, a part of the long-past history of
Samavia, and he had loved it for that reason. Lazarus had often
told it to him, sometimes adding much detail, but he had always
liked best his father's version, which seemed a thrilling and
living thing. On their journey from Russia, during an hour when
they had been forced to wait in a cold wayside station and had
found the time long, Loristan had discussed it with him. He
always found some such way of making hard and comfortless hours
easier to live through.
``Fine, big lad--for a foreigner,'' Marco heard a man say to his
companion as he passed them this morning. ``Looks like a Pole or
a Russian.''
It was this which had led his thoughts back to the story of the
Lost Prince. He knew that most of the people who looked at him
and called him a ``foreigner'' had not even heard of Samavia.
Those who chanced to recall its existence knew of it only as a
small fierce country, so placed upon the map that the larger
countries which were its neighbors felt they must control and
keep it in order, and therefore made incursions into it, and
fought its people and each other for possession. But it had not
been always so. It was an old, old country, and hundreds of
years ago it had been as celebrated for its peaceful happiness
and wealth as for its beauty. It was often said that it was one
of the most beautiful places in the world. A favorite Samavian
legend was that it had been the site of the Garden of Eden. In
those past centuries, its people had been of such great stature,
physical beauty, and strength, that they had been like a race of
noble giants. They were in those days a pastoral people, whose
rich crops and splendid flocks and herds were the envy of less
fertile countries. Among the shepherds and herdsmen there were
poets who sang their own songs when they piped among their sheep
upon the mountain sides and in the flower-thick valleys. Their
songs had been about patriotism and bravery, and faithfulness to
their chieftains and their country. The simple courtesy of the
poorest peasant was as stately as the manner of a noble. But
that, as Loristan had said with a tired smile, had been before
they had had time to outlive and forget the Garden of Eden. Five
hundred years ago, there had succeeded to the throne a king who
was bad and weak. His father had lived to be ninety years old,
and his son had grown tired of waiting in Samavia for his crown.
He had gone out into the world, and visited other countries and
their courts. When he returned and became king, he lived as no
Samavian king had lived before. He was an extravagant, vicious
man of furious temper and bitter jealousies. He was jealous of
the larger courts and countries he had seen, and tried
to introduce their customs and their ambitions. He ended by
introducing their worst faults and vices. There arose political
quarrels and savage new factions. Money was squandered until
poverty began for the first time to stare the country in the
face. The big Samavians, after their first stupefaction, broke
forth into furious rage. There were mobs and riots, then bloody
battles. Since it was the king who had worked this wrong, they
would have none of him. They would depose him and make his son
king in his place. It was at this part of the story that Marco
was always most deeply interested. The young prince was totally
unlike his father. He was a true royal Samavian. He was bigger
and stronger for his age than any man in the country, and he was
as handsome as a young Viking god. More than this, he had a
lion's heart, and before he was sixteen, the shepherds and
herdsmen had already begun to make songs about his young valor,
and his kingly courtesy, and generous kindness. Not only the
shepherds and herdsmen sang them, but the people in the streets.
The king, his father, had always been jealous of him, even when
he was only a beautiful, stately child whom the people roared
with joy to see as he rode through the streets. When he returned
from his journeyings and found him a splendid youth, he detested
him. When the people began to clamor and demand that he himself
should abdicate, he became insane with rage, and committed such
cruelties that the people ran mad themselves. One day they
stormed the palace, killed and overpowered the guards, and,
rushing into the royal apartments, burst in upon the king as he
shuddered green with terror and fury in his private room. He was
king no more, and must leave the country, they vowed, as they
closed round him with bared weapons and shook them in his face.
Where was the prince? They must see him and tell him their
ultimatum. It was he whom they wanted for a king. They trusted
him and would obey him. They began to shout aloud his name,
calling him in a sort of chant in unison, ``Prince Ivor--Prince
Ivor--Prince Ivor!'' But no answer came. The people of the
palace had hidden themselves, and the place was utterly silent.
The king, despite his terror, could not help but sneer.
``Call him again,'' he said. ``He is afraid to come out of his
hole!''
A savage fellow from the mountain fastnesses struck him on the
mouth.
``He afraid!'' he shouted. ``If he does not come, it is because
thou hast killed him--and thou art a dead man!''
This set them aflame with hotter burning. They broke away,
leaving three on guard, and ran about the empty palace rooms
shouting the prince's name. But there was no answer. They
sought him in a frenzy, bursting open doors and flinging down
every obstacle in their way. A page, found hidden in a closet,
owned that he had seen His Royal Highness pass through a corridor
early in the morning. He had been softly singing to himself one
of the shepherd's songs.
And in this strange way out of the history of Samavia, five
hundred years before Marco's day, the young prince had walked--
singing softly to himself the old song of Samavia's beauty and
happiness. For he was never seen again.
In every nook and cranny, high and low, they sought for him,
believing that the king himself had made him prisoner in some
secret place, or had privately had him killed. The fury of the
people grew to frenzy. There were new risings, and every few
days the palace was attacked and searched again. But no trace of
the prince was found. He had vanished as a star vanishes when it
drops from its place in the sky. During a riot in the palace,
when a last fruitless search was made, the king himself was
killed. A powerful noble who headed one of the uprisings made
himself king in his place. From that time, the once splendid
little kingdom was like a bone fought for by dogs. Its pastoral
peace was forgotten. It was torn and worried and shaken by
stronger countries. It tore and worried itself with internal
fights. It assassinated kings and created new ones. No man was
sure in his youth what ruler his maturity would live under, or
whether his children would die in useless fights, or through
stress of poverty and cruel, useless laws. There were no more
shepherds and herdsmen who were poets, but on the mountain sides
and in the valleys sometimes some of the old songs were sung.
Those most beloved were songs about a Lost Prince whose name had
been Ivor. If he had been king, he would have saved Samavia, the
verses said, and all brave hearts believed that he would still
return. In the modern cities, one of the jocular cynical sayings
was, ``Yes, that will happen when Prince Ivor comes again.''
In his more childish days, Marco had been bitterly troubled by
the unsolved mystery. Where had he gone--the Lost Prince? Had
he been killed, or had he been hidden away in a dungeon? But he
was so big and brave, he would have broken out of any dungeon.
The boy had invented for himself a dozen endings to the story.
``Did no one ever find his sword or his cap--or hear anything or
guess anything about him ever--ever--ever?'' he would say
restlessly again and again.
One winter's night, as they sat together before a small fire in a
cold room in a cold city in Austria, he had been so eager and
asked so many searching questions, that his father gave him an
answer he had never given him before, and which was a sort of
ending to the story, though not a satisfying one:
``Everybody guessed as you are guessing. A few very old
shepherds in the mountains who like to believe ancient histories
relate a story which most people consider a kind of legend. It
is that almost a hundred years after the prince was lost, an old
shepherd told a story his long-dead father had confided to him in
secret just before he died. The father had said that, going out
in the early morning on the mountain side, he had found in the
forest what he at first thought to be the dead body of a
beautiful, boyish, young huntsman. Some enemy had plainly
attacked him from behind and believed he had killed him. He was,
however, not quite dead, and the shepherd dragged him into a cave
where he himself often took refuge from storms with his flocks.
Since there was such riot and disorder in the city, he was afraid
to speak of what he had found; and, by the time he discovered
that he was harboring the prince, the king had already been
killed, and an even worse man had taken possession of his throne,
and ruled Samavia with a blood-stained, iron hand. To the
terrified and simple peasant the safest thing seemed to get the
wounded youth out of the country before there was any chance of
his being discovered and murdered outright, as he would surely
be. The cave in which he was hidden was not far from the
frontier, and while he was still so weak that he was hardly
conscious of what befell him, he was smuggled across it in a cart
loaded with sheepskins, and left with some kind monks who did not
know his rank or name. The shepherd went back to his flocks and
his mountains, and lived and died among them, always in terror of
the changing rulers and their savage battles with each other.
The mountaineers said among themselves, as the generations
succeeded each other, that the Lost Prince must have died young,
because otherwise he would have come back to his country and
tried to restore its good, bygone days.''
``Yes, he would have come,'' Marco said.
``He would have come if he had seen that he could help his
people,'' Loristan answered, as if he were not reflecting on a
story which was probably only a kind of legend. ``But he was
very young, and Samavia was in the hands of the new dynasty, and
filled with his enemies. He could not have crossed the frontier
without an army. Still, I think he died young.''
It was of this story that Marco was thinking as he walked, and
perhaps the thoughts that filled his mind expressed themselves in
his face in some way which attracted attention. As he was
nearing Buckingham Palace, a distinguished-looking well-dressed
man with clever eyes caught sight of him, and, after looking at
him keenly, slackened his pace as he approached him from the
opposite direction. An observer might have thought he saw
something which puzzled and surprised him. Marco didn't see him
at all, and still moved forward, thinking of the shepherds and
the prince. The well- dressed man began to walk still more
slowly. When he was quite close to Marco, he stopped and spoke
to him--in the Samavian language.
``What is your name?'' he asked.
Marco's training from his earliest childhood had been an extraordinary
thing. His love for his father had made it simple and
natural to him, and he had never questioned the reason for it.
As he had been taught to keep silence, he had been taught to
control the expression of his face and the sound of his voice,
and, above all, never to allow himself to look startled. But for
this he might have started at the extraordinary sound of the
Samavian words suddenly uttered in a London street by an English
gentleman. He might even have answered the question in Samavian
himself. But he did not. He courteously lifted his cap and
replied in English:
``Excuse me?''
The gentleman's clever eyes scrutinized him keenly. Then he also
spoke in English.
``Perhaps you do not understand? I asked your name because you
are very like a Samavian I know,'' he said.
``I am Marco Loristan,'' the boy answered him.
The man looked straight into his eyes and smiled.
``That is not the name,'' he said. ``I beg your pardon, my
boy.''
He was about to go on, and had indeed taken a couple of steps
away, when he paused and turned to him again.
``You may tell your father that you are a very well-trained lad.
I wanted to find out for myself.'' And he went on.
Marco felt that his heart beat a little quickly. This was one of
several incidents which had happened during the last three years,
and made him feel that he was living among things so mysterious
that their very mystery hinted at danger. But he himself had
never before seemed involved in them. Why should it matter that
he was well-behaved? Then he remembered something. The man had
not said ``well-behaved,'' he had said ``well-TRAINED.''
Well-trained in what way? He felt his forehead prickle slightly
as he thought of the smiling, keen look which set itself so
straight upon him. Had he spoken to him in Samavian for an
experiment, to see if he would be startled into forgetting that
he had been trained to seem to know only the language of the
country he was temporarily living in? But he had not forgotten.
He had remembered well, and was thankful that he had betrayed
nothing. ``Even exiles may be Samavian soldiers. I am one. You
must be one,'' his father had said on that day long ago when he
had made him take his oath. Perhaps remembering his training was
being a soldier. Never had Samavia needed help as she needed it
to-day. Two years before, a rival claimant to the throne had
assassinated the then reigning king and his sons, and since then,
bloody war and tumult had raged. The new king was a powerful
man, and had a great following of the worst and most self-seeking
of the people. Neighboring countries had interfered for their
own welfare's sake, and the newspapers had been full of stories
of savage fighting and atrocities, and of starving peasants.
Marco had late one evening entered their lodgings to find
Loristan walking to and fro like a lion in a cage, a paper
crushed and torn in his hands, and his eyes blazing. He had been
reading of cruelties wrought upon innocent peasants and women and
children. Lazarus was standing staring at him with huge tears
running down his cheeks. When Marco opened the door, the old
soldier strode over to him, turned him about, and led him out of
the room.
``Pardon, sir, pardon!'' he sobbed. ``No one must see him, not
even you. He suffers so horribly.''
He stood by a chair in Marco's own small bedroom, where he half
pushed, half led him. He bent his grizzled head, and wept like a
beaten child.
``Dear God of those who are in pain, assuredly it is now the time
to give back to us our Lost Prince!'' he said, and Marco knew the
words were a prayer, and wondered at the frenzied intensity of
it, because it seemed so wild a thing to pray for the return of a
youth who had died five hundred years before.
When he reached the palace, he was still thinking of the man who
had spoken to him. He was thinking of him even as he looked at
the majestic gray stone building and counted the number of its
stories and windows. He walked round it that he might make a
note in his memory of its size and form and its entrances, and
guess at the size of its gardens. This he did because it was
part of his game, and part of his strange training.
When he came back to the front, he saw that in the great entrance
court within the high iron railings an elegant but quiet- looking
closed carriage was drawing up before the doorway. Marco stood
and watched with interest to see who would come out and enter it.
He knew that kings and emperors who were not on parade looked
merely like well-dressed private gentlemen, and often chose to go
out as simply and quietly as other men. So he thought that,
perhaps, if he waited, he might see one of those well-known faces
which represent the highest rank and power in a monarchical
country, and which in times gone by had also represented the
power over human life and death and liberty.
``I should like to be able to tell my father that I have seen the
King and know his face, as I know the faces of the czar and the
two emperors.''
There was a little movement among the tall men-servants in the
royal scarlet liveries, and an elderly man descended the steps
attended by another who walked behind him. He entered the
carriage, the other man followed him, the door was closed, and
the carriage drove through the entrance gates, where the sentries
saluted.
Marco was near enough to see distinctly. The two men were
talking as if interested. The face of the one farthest from him
was the face he had often seen in shop-windows and newspapers.
The boy made his quick, formal salute. It was the King; and, as
he smiled and acknowledged his greeting, he spoke to his
companion.
``That fine lad salutes as if he belonged to the army,'' was what
he said, though Marco could not hear him.
His companion leaned forward to look through the window. When he
caught sight of Marco, a singular expression crossed his face.
``He does belong to an army, sir,'' he answered, ``though he does
not know it. His name is Marco Loristan.''
Then Marco saw him plainly for the first time. He was the man
with the keen eyes who had spoken to him in Samavian.
IV
THE RAT
Marco would have wondered very much if he had heard the words,
but, as he did not hear them, he turned toward home wondering at
something else. A man who was in intimate attendance on a king
must be a person of importance. He no doubt knew many things not
only of his own ruler's country, but of the countries of other
kings. But so few had really known anything of poor little
Samavia until the newspapers had begun to tell them of the
horrors of its war--and who but a Samavian could speak its
language? It would be an interesting thing to tell his
father--that a man who knew the King had spoken to him in
Samavian, and had sent that curious message.
Later he found himself passing a side street and looked up it.
It was so narrow, and on either side of it were such old, tall,
and sloping-walled houses that it attracted his attention. It
looked as if a bit of old London had been left to stand while
newer places grew up and hid it from view. This was the kind of
street he liked to pass through for curiosity's sake. He knew
many of them in the old quarters of many cities. He had lived in
some of them. He could find his way home from the other end of
it. Another thing than its queerness attracted him. He heard a
clamor of boys' voices, and he wanted to see what they were
doing. Sometimes, when he had reached a new place and had had
that lonely feeling, he had followed some boyish clamor of play
or wrangling, and had found a temporary friend or so.
Half-way to the street's end there was an arched brick passage.
The sound of the voices came from there--one of them high, and
thinner and shriller than the rest. Marco tramped up to the arch
and looked down through the passage. It opened on to a gray
flagged space, shut in by the railings of a black, deserted, and
ancient graveyard behind a venerable church which turned its face
toward some other street. The boys were not playing, but
listening to one of their number who was reading to them from a
newspaper.
Marco walked down the passage and listened also, standing in the
dark arched outlet at its end and watching the boy who read. He
was a strange little creature with a big forehead, and deep eyes
which were curiously sharp. But this was not all. He had a
hunch back, his legs seemed small and crooked. He sat with them
crossed before him on a rough wooden platform set on low wheels,
on which he evidently pushed himself about. Near him were a
number of sticks stacked together as if they were rifles. One of
the first things that Marco noticed was that he had a savage
little face marked with lines as if he had been angry all his
life.
``Hold your tongues, you fools!'' he shrilled out to some boys
who interrupted him. ``Don't you want to know anything, you
ignorant swine?''
He was as ill-dressed as the rest of them, but he did not speak
in the Cockney dialect. If he was of the riffraff of the
streets, as his companions were, he was somehow different.
Then he, by chance, saw Marco, who was standing in the arched end
of the passage.
``What are you doing there listening?'' he shouted, and at once
stooped to pick up a stone and threw it at him. The stone hit
Marco's shoulder, but it did not hurt him much. What he did not
like was that another lad should want to throw something at him
before they had even exchanged boy-signs. He also did not like
the fact that two other boys promptly took the matter up by
bending down to pick up stones also.
He walked forward straight into the group and stopped close to
the hunchback.
``What did you do that for?'' he asked, in his rather deep young
voice.
He was big and strong-looking enough to suggest that he was not a
boy it would be easy to dispose of, but it was not that which
made the group stand still a moment to stare at him. It was
something in himself--half of it a kind of impartial lack of
anything like irritation at the stone-throwing. It was as if it
had not mattered to him in the least. It had not made him feel
angry or insulted. He was only rather curious about it. Because
he was clean, and his hair and his shabby clothes were brushed,
the first impression given by his appearance as he stood in the
archway was that he was a young ``toff'' poking his nose where it
was not wanted; but, as he drew near, they saw that the
well-brushed clothes were worn, and there were patches on his
shoes.
``What did you do that for?'' he asked, and he asked it merely as
if he wanted to find out the reason.
``I'm not going to have you swells dropping in to my club as if
it was your own,'' said the hunchback.
``I'm not a swell, and I didn't know it was a club,'' Marco
answered. ``I heard boys, and I thought I'd come and look. When
I heard you reading about Samavia, I wanted to hear.''
He looked at the reader with his silent-expressioned eyes.
``You needn't have thrown a stone,'' he added. ``They don't do
it at men's clubs. I'll go away.''
He turned about as if he were going, but, before he had taken
three steps, the hunchback hailed him unceremoniously.
``Hi!'' he called out. ``Hi, you!''
``What do you want?'' said Marco.
``I bet you don't know where Samavia is, or what they're fighting
about.'' The hunchback threw the words at him.
``Yes, I do. It's north of Beltrazo and east of Jiardasia, and
they are fighting because one party has assassinated King Maran,
and the other will not let them crown Nicola Iarovitch. And why
should they? He's a brigand, and hasn't a drop of royal blood in
him.''
``Oh!'' reluctantly admitted the hunchback. ``You do know that
much, do you? Come back here.''
Marco turned back, while the boys still stared. It was as if two
leaders or generals were meeting for the first time, and the
rabble, looking on, wondered what would come of their encounter.
``The Samavians of the Iarovitch party are a bad lot and want
only bad things,'' said Marco, speaking first. ``They care
nothing for Samavia. They only care for money and the power to
make laws which will serve them and crush everybody else. They
know Nicola is a weak man, and that, if they can crown him king,
they can make him do what they like.''
The fact that he spoke first, and that, though he spoke in a
steady boyish voice without swagger, he somehow seemed to take it
for granted that they would listen, made his place for him at
once. Boys are impressionable creatures, and they know a leader
when they see him. The hunchback fixed glittering eyes on him.
The rabble began to murmur.
``Rat! Rat!'' several voices cried at once in good strong
Cockney. ``Arst 'im some more, Rat!''
``Is that what they call you?'' Marco asked the hunchback.
``It's what I called myself,'' he answered resentfully. `` `The
Rat.' Look at me! Crawling round on the ground like this! Look
at me!''
He made a gesture ordering his followers to move aside, and began
to push himself rapidly, with queer darts this side and that
round the inclosure. He bent his head and body, and twisted his
face, and made strange animal-like movements. He even uttered
sharp squeaks as he rushed here and there--as a rat might have
done when it was being hunted. He did it as if he were
displaying an accomplishment, and his followers' laughter was
applause.
``Wasn't I like a rat?'' he demanded, when he suddenly stopped.
``You made yourself like one on purpose,'' Marco answered. ``You
do it for fun.''
``Not so much fun,'' said The Rat. ``I feel like one. Every
one's my enemy. I'm vermin. I can't fight or defend myself
unless I bite. I can bite, though.'' And he showed two rows of
fierce, strong, white teeth, sharper at the points than human
teeth usually are. ``I bite my father when he gets drunk and
beats me. I've bitten him till he's learned to remember.'' He
laughed a shrill, squeaking laugh. ``He hasn't tried it for
three months--even when he was drunk-- and he's always drunk.''
Then he laughed again still more shrilly. ``He's a gentleman,''
he said. ``I'm a gentleman's son. He was a Master at a big
school until he was kicked out--that was when I was four and my
mother died. I'm thirteen now. How old are you?''
``I'm twelve,'' answered Marco.
The Rat twisted his face enviously.
``I wish I was your size! Are you a gentleman's son? You look
as if you were.''
``I'm a very poor man's son,'' was Marco's answer. ``My father
is a writer.''
``Then, ten to one, he's a sort of gentleman,'' said The Rat.
Then quite suddenly he threw another question at him. ``What's
the name of the other Samavian party?''
``The Maranovitch. The Maranovitch and the Iarovitch have been
fighting with each other for five hundred years. First one
dynasty rules, and then the other gets in when it has killed
somebody as it killed King Maran,'' Marco answered without
hesitation.
``What was the name of the dynasty that ruled before they began
fighting? The first Maranovitch assassinated the last of them,''
The Rat asked him.
``The Fedorovitch,'' said Marco. ``The last one was a bad
king.''
``His son was the one they never found again,'' said The Rat.
``The one they call the Lost Prince.''
Marco would have started but for his long training in exterior
self-control. It was so strange to hear his dream-hero spoken of
in this back alley in a slum, and just after he had been thinking
of him.
``What do you know about him?'' he asked, and, as he did so, he
saw the group of vagabond lads draw nearer.
``Not much. I only read something about him in a torn magazine I
found in the street,'' The Rat answered. ``The man that wrote
about him said he was only part of a legend, and he laughed at
people for believing in him. He said it was about time that he
should turn up again if he intended to. I've invented things
about him because these chaps like to hear me tell them. They're
only stories.''
``We likes 'im,'' a voice called out, ``becos 'e wos the right
sort; 'e'd fight, 'e would, if 'e was in Samavia now.''
Marco rapidly asked himself how much he might say. He decided
and spoke to them all.
``He is not part of a legend. He's part of Samavian history,''
he said. ``I know something about him too.''
``How did you find it out?'' asked The Rat.
``Because my father's a writer, he's obliged to have books and
papers, and he knows things. I like to read, and I go into the
free libraries. You can always get books and papers there. Then
I ask my father questions. All the newspapers are full of things
about Samavia just now.'' Marco felt that this was an
explanation which betrayed nothing. It was true that no one
could open a newspaper at this period without seeing news and
stories of Samavia.
The Rat saw possible vistas of information opening up before him.
``Sit down here,'' he said, ``and tell us what you know about
him. Sit down, you fellows.''
There was nothing to sit on but the broken flagged pavement, but
that was a small matter. Marco himself had sat on flags or bare
ground often enough before, and so had the rest of the lads. He
took his place near The Rat, and the others made a semicircle in
front of them. The two leaders had joined forces, so to speak,
and the followers fell into line at ``attention.''
Then the new-comer began to talk. It was a good story, that of
the Lost Prince, and Marco told it in a way which gave it
reality. How could he help it? He knew, as they could not, that
it was real. He who had pored over maps of little Samavia since
his seventh year, who had studied them with his father, knew it
as a country he could have found his way to any part of if he had
been dropped in any forest or any mountain of it. He knew every
highway and byway, and in the capital city of Melzarr could
almost have made his way blindfolded. He knew the palaces and
the forts, the churches, the poor streets and the rich ones. His
father had once shown him a plan of the royal palace which they
had studied together until the boy knew each apartment and
corridor in it by heart. But this he did not speak of. He knew
it was one of the things to be silent about. But of the
mountains and the emerald velvet meadows climbing their sides and
only ending where huge bare crags and peaks began, he could
speak. He could make pictures of the wide fertile plains where
herds of wild horses fed, or raced and sniffed the air; he could
describe the fertile valleys where clear rivers ran and flocks of
sheep pastured on deep sweet grass. He could speak of them
because he could offer a good enough reason for his knowledge of
them. It was not the only reason he had for his knowledge, but
it was one which would serve well enough.
``That torn magazine you found had more than one article about
Samavia in it,'' he said to The Rat. ``The same man wrote four.
I read them all in a free library. He had been to Samavia, and
knew a great deal about it. He said it was one of the most
beautiful countries he had ever traveled in--and the most
fertile. That's what they all say of it.''
The group before him knew nothing of fertility or open country.
They only knew London back streets and courts. Most of them had
never traveled as far as the public parks, and in fact scarcely
believed in their existence. They were a rough lot, and as they
had stared at Marco at first sight of him, so they continued to
stare at him as he talked. When he told of the tall Samavians
who had been like giants centuries ago, and who had hunted the
wild horses and captured and trained them to obedience by a sort
of strong and gentle magic, their mouths fell open. This was the
sort of thing to allure any boy's imagination.
``Blimme, if I wouldn't 'ave liked ketchin' one o' them 'orses,''
broke in one of the audience, and his exclamation was followed by
a dozen of like nature from the others. Who wouldn't have liked
``ketchin' one''?
When he told of the deep endless-seeming forests, and of the
herdsmen and shepherds who played on their pipes and made songs
about high deeds and bravery, they grinned with pleasure without
knowing they were grinning. They did not really know that in
this neglected, broken-flagged inclosure, shut in on one side by
smoke- blackened, poverty-stricken houses, and on the other by a
deserted and forgotten sunken graveyard, they heard the rustle of
green forest boughs where birds nested close, the swish of the
summer wind in the river reeds, and the tinkle and laughter and
rush of brooks running.
They heard more or less of it all through the Lost Prince story,
because Prince Ivor had loved lowland woods and mountain forests
and all out-of-door life. When Marco pictured him tall and
strong- limbed and young, winning all the people when he rode
smiling among them, the boys grinned again with unconscious
pleasure.
``Wisht 'e 'adn't got lost!'' some one cried out.
When they heard of the unrest and dissatisfaction of the
Samavians, they began to get restless themselves. When Marco
reached the part of the story in which the mob rushed into the
palace and demanded their prince from the king, they ejaculated
scraps of bad language. ``The old geezer had got him hidden
somewhere in some dungeon, or he'd killed him out an' out--that's
what he'd been up to!'' they clamored. ``Wisht the lot of us had
been there then--wisht we 'ad. We'd 'ave give' 'im wot for,
anyway!''
``An' 'im walkin' out o' the place so early in the mornin' just
singin' like that! 'E 'ad 'im follered an' done for!'' they
decided with various exclamations of boyish wrath. Somehow, the
fact that the handsome royal lad had strolled into the morning
sunshine singing made them more savage. Their language was
extremely bad at this point.
But if it was bad here, it became worse when the old shepherd
found the young huntsman's half-dead body in the forest. He HAD
``bin `done for' IN THE BACK! 'E'd bin give' no charnst.
G-r-r-r!'' they groaned in chorus. ``Wisht'' THEY'D ``bin there
when 'e'd bin 'it!'' They'd `` 'ave done fur somebody''
themselves. It was a story which had a queer effect on them. It
made them think they saw things; it fired their blood; it set
them wanting to fight for ideals they knew nothing
about--adventurous things, for instance, and high and noble young
princes who were full of the possibility of great and good deeds.
Sitting upon the broken flagstones of the bit of ground behind
the deserted graveyard, they were suddenly dragged into the world
of romance, and noble young princes and great and good deeds
became as real as the sunken gravestones, and far more
interesting.
And then the smuggling across the frontier of the unconscious
prince in the bullock cart loaded with sheepskins! They held
their breaths. Would the old shepherd get him past the line!
Marco, who was lost in the recital himself, told it as if he had
been present. He felt as if he had, and as this was the first
time he had ever told it to thrilled listeners, his imagination
got him in its grip, and his heart jumped in his breast as he was
sure the old man's must have done when the guard stopped his cart
and asked him what he was carrying out of the country. He knew
he must have had to call up all his strength to force his voice
into steadiness.
And then the good monks! He had to stop to explain what a monk
was, and when he described the solitude of the ancient monastery,
and its walled gardens full of flowers and old simples to be used
for healing, and the wise monks walking in the silence and the
sun, the boys stared a little helplessly, but still as if they
were vaguely pleased by the picture.
And then there was no more to tell--no more. There it broke off,
and something like a low howl of dismay broke from the
semicircle.
``Aw!'' they protested, ``it 'adn't ought to stop there! Ain't
there no more? Is that all there is?''
``It's all that was ever known really. And that last part might
only be a sort of story made up by somebody. But I believe it
myself.''
The Rat had listened with burning eyes. He had sat biting his
finger-nails, as was a trick of his when he was excited or angry.
``Tell you what!'' he exclaimed suddenly. ``This was what
happened. It was some of the Maranovitch fellows that tried to
kill him. They meant to kill his father and make their own man
king, and they knew the people wouldn't stand it if young Ivor
was alive. They just stabbed him in the back, the fiends! I
dare say they heard the old shepherd coming, and left him for
dead and ran.''
``Right, oh! That was it!'' the lads agreed. ``Yer right there,
Rat!''
``When he got well,'' The Rat went on feverishly, still biting
his nails, ``he couldn't go back. He was only a boy. The other
fellow had been crowned, and his followers felt strong because
they'd just conquered the country. He could have done nothing
without an army, and he was too young to raise one. Perhaps he
thought he'd wait till he was old enough to know what to do. I
dare say he went away and had to work for his living as if he'd
never been a prince at all. Then perhaps sometime he married
somebody and had a son, and told him as a secret who he was and
all about Samavia.'' The Rat began to look vengeful. ``If I'd
bin him I'd have told him not to forget what the Maranovitch had
done to me. I'd have told him that if I couldn't get back the
throne, he must see what he could do when he grew to be a man.
And I'd have made him swear, if he got it back, to take it out of
them or their children or their children's children in torture
and killing. I'd have made him swear not to leave a Maranovitch
alive. And I'd have told him that, if he couldn't do it in his
life, he must pass the oath on to his son and his son's son, as
long as there was a Fedorovitch on earth. Wouldn't you?'' he
demanded hotly of Marco.
Marco's blood was also hot, but it was a different kind of blood,
and he had talked too much to a very sane man.
``No,'' he said slowly. ``What would have been the use? It
wouldn't have done Samavia any good, and it wouldn't have done
him any good to torture and kill people. Better keep them alive
and make them do things for the country. If you're a patriot,
you think of the country.'' He wanted to add ``That's what my
father says,'' but he did not.
``Torture 'em first and then attend to the country,'' snapped The
Rat. ``What would you have told your son if you'd been Ivor?''
``I'd have told him to learn everything about Samavia--and all
the things kings have to know--and study things about laws and
other countries--and about keeping silent--and about governing
himself as if he were a general commanding soldiers in battle--so
that he would never do anything he did not mean to do or could be
ashamed of doing after it was over. And I'd have asked him to
tell his son's sons to tell their sons to learn the same things.
So, you see, however long the time was, there would always be a
king getting ready for Samavia--when Samavia really wanted him.
And he would be a real king.''
He stopped himself suddenly and looked at the staring semicircle.
``I didn't make that up myself,'' he said. ``I have heard a man
who reads and knows things say it. I believe the Lost Prince
would have had the same thoughts. If he had, and told them to
his son, there has been a line of kings in training for Samavia
for five hundred years, and perhaps one is walking about the
streets of Vienna, or Budapest, or Paris, or London now, and he'd
be ready if the people found out about him and called him.''
``Wisht they would!'' some one yelled.
``It would be a queer secret to know all the time when no one
else knew it,'' The Rat communed with himself as it were, ``that
you were a king and you ought to be on a throne wearing a crown.
I wonder if it would make a chap look different?''
He laughed his squeaky laugh, and then turned in his sudden way
to Marco:
``But he'd be a fool to give up the vengeance. What is your
name?''
``Marco Loristan. What's yours? It isn't The Rat really.''
``It's Jem RATcliffe. That's pretty near. Where do you live?''
``No. 7 Philibert Place.''
``This club is a soldiers' club,'' said The Rat. ``It's called
the Squad. I'm the captain. 'Tention, you fellows! Let's show
him.''
The semicircle sprang to its feet. There were about twelve lads
altogether, and, when they stood upright, Marco saw at once that
for some reason they were accustomed to obeying the word of
command with military precision.
``Form in line!'' ordered The Rat.
They did it at once, and held their backs and legs straight and
their heads up amazingly well. Each had seized one of the sticks
which had been stacked together like guns.
The Rat himself sat up straight on his platform. There was
actually something military in the bearing of his lean body. His
voice lost its squeak and its sharpness became commanding.
He put the dozen lads through the drill as if he had been a smart
young officer. And the drill itself was prompt and smart enough
to have done credit to practiced soldiers in barracks. It made
Marco involuntarily stand very straight himself, and watch with
surprised interest.
``That's good!'' he exclaimed when it was at an end. ``How did
you learn that?''
The Rat made a savage gesture.
``If I'd had legs to stand on, I'd have been a soldier!'' he
said. ``I'd have enlisted in any regiment that would take me. I
don't care for anything else.''
Suddenly his face changed, and he shouted a command to his
followers.
``Turn your backs!'' he ordered.
And they did turn their backs and looked through the railings of
the old churchyard. Marco saw that they were obeying an order
which was not new to them. The Rat had thrown his arm up over
his eyes and covered them. He held it there for several moments,
as if he did not want to be seen. Marco turned his back as the
rest had done. All at once he understood that, though The Rat
was not crying, yet he was feeling something which another boy
would possibly have broken down under.
``All right!'' he shouted presently, and dropped his
ragged-sleeved arm and sat up straight again.
``I want to go to war!'' he said hoarsely. ``I want to fight! I
want to lead a lot of men into battle! And I haven't got any
legs. Sometimes it takes the pluck out of me.''
``You've not grown up yet!'' said Marco. ``You might get strong.
No one knows what is going to happen. How did you learn to drill
the club?''
``I hang about barracks. I watch and listen. I follow soldiers.
If I could get books, I'd read about wars. I can't go to
libraries as you can. I can do nothing but scuffle about like a
rat.''
``I can take you to some libraries,'' said Marco. ``There are
places where boys can get in. And I can get some papers from my
father.''
``Can you?'' said The Rat. ``Do you want to join the club?''
``Yes!'' Marco answered. ``I'll speak to my father about it.''
He said it because the hungry longing for companionship in his
own mind had found a sort of response in the queer hungry look in
The Rat's eyes. He wanted to see him again. Strange creature as
he was, there was attraction in him. Scuffling about on his low
wheeled platform, he had drawn this group of rough lads to him
and made himself their commander. They obeyed him; they listened
to his stories and harangues about war and soldiering; they let
him drill them and give them orders. Marco knew that, when he
told his father about him, he would be interested. The boy
wanted to hear what Loristan would say.
``I'm going home now,'' he said. ``If you're going to be here
to- morrow, I will try to come.''
``We shall be here,'' The Rat answered. ``It's our barracks.''
Marco drew himself up smartly and made his salute as if to a
superior officer. Then he wheeled about and marched through the
brick archway, and the sound of his boyish tread was as regular
and decided as if he had been a man keeping time with his
regiment.
``He's been drilled himself,'' said The Rat. ``He knows as much
as I do.''
And he sat up and stared down the passage with new interest.
V
``SILENCE IS STILL THE ORDER''
They were even poorer than usual just now, and the supper Marco
and his father sat down to was scant enough. Lazarus stood
upright behind his master's chair and served him with strictest
ceremony. Their poor lodgings were always kept with a soldierly
cleanliness and order. When an object could be polished it was
forced to shine, no grain of dust was allowed to lie undisturbed,
and this perfection was not attained through the ministrations of
a lodging house slavey. Lazarus made himself extremely popular
by taking the work of caring for his master's rooms entirely out
of the hands of the overburdened maids of all work. He had
learned to do many things in his young days in barracks. He
carried about with him coarse bits of table-cloths and towels,
which he laundered as if they had been the finest linen. He
mended, he patched, he darned, and in the hardest fight the poor
must face--the fight with dirt and dinginess--he always held his
own. They had nothing but dry bread and coffee this evening, but
Lazarus had made the coffee and the bread was good.
As Marco ate, he told his father the story of The Rat and his
followers. Loristan listened, as the boy had known he would,
with the far-off, intently-thinking smile in his dark eyes. It
was a look which always fascinated Marco because it meant that he
was thinking so many things. Perhaps he would tell some of them
and perhaps he would not. His spell over the boy lay in the fact
that to him he seemed like a wonderful book of which one had only
glimpses. It was full of pictures and adventures which were
true, and one could not help continually making guesses about
them. Yes, the feeling that Marco had was that his father's
attraction for him was a sort of spell, and that others felt the
same thing. When he stood and talked to commoner people, he held
his tall body with singular quiet grace which was like power. He
never stirred or moved himself as if he were nervous or
uncertain. He could hold his hands (he had beautiful slender and
strong hands) quite still; he could stand on his fine arched feet
without shuffling them. He could sit without any ungrace or
restlessness. His mind knew what his body should do, and gave it
orders without speaking, and his fine limbs and muscles and
nerves obeyed. So he could stand still and at ease and look at
the people he was talking to, and they always looked at him and
listened to what he said, and somehow, courteous and
uncondescending as his manner unfailingly was, it used always to
seem to Marco as if he were ``giving an audience'' as kings gave
them.
He had often seen people bow very low when they went away from
him, and more than once it had happened that some humble person
had stepped out of his presence backward, as people do when
retiring before a sovereign. And yet his bearing was the
quietest and least assuming in the world.
``And they were talking about Samavia? And he knew the story of
the Lost Prince?'' he said ponderingly. ``Even in that place!''
``He wants to hear about wars--he wants to talk about them,''
Marco answered. ``If he could stand and were old enough, he
would go and fight for Samavia himself.''
``It is a blood-drenched and sad place now!'' said Loristan.
``The people are mad when they are not heartbroken and
terrified.''
Suddenly Marco struck the table with a sounding slap of his boy's
hand. He did it before he realized any intention in his own
mind.
``Why should either one of the Iarovitch or one of the
Maranovitch be king!'' he cried. ``They were only savage
peasants when they first fought for the crown hundreds of years
ago. The most savage one got it, and they have been fighting
ever since. Only the Fedorovitch were born kings. There is only
one man in the world who has the right to the throne--and I don't
know whether he is in the world or not. But I believe he is! I
do!''
Loristan looked at his hot twelve-year-old face with a reflective
curiousness. He saw that the flame which had leaped up in him
had leaped without warning--just as a fierce heart-beat might
have shaken him.
``You mean--?'' he suggested softly.
``Ivor Fedorovitch. King Ivor he ought to be. And the people
would obey him, and the good days would come again.''
``It is five hundred years since Ivor Fedorovitch left the good
monks.'' Loristan still spoke softly.
``But, Father,'' Marco protested, ``even The Rat said what you
said--that he was too young to be able to come back while the
Maranovitch were in power. And he would have to work and have a
home, and perhaps he is as poor as we are. But when he had a son
he would call him Ivor and TELL him--and his son would call HIS
son Ivor and tell HIM--and it would go on and on. They could
never call their eldest sons anything but Ivor. And what you
said about the training would be true. There would always be a
king being trained for Samavia, and ready to be called.'' In the
fire of his feelings he sprang from his chair and stood upright.
``Why! There may be a king of Samavia in some city now who knows
he is king, and, when he reads about the fighting among his
people, his blood gets red-hot. They're his own people--his very
own! He ought to go to them--he ought to go and tell them who he
is! Don't you think he ought, Father?''
``It would not be as easy as it seems to a boy,'' Loristan
answered. ``There are many countries which would have something
to say-- Russia would have her word, and Austria, and Germany;
and England never is silent. But, if he were a strong man and
knew how to make strong friends in silence, he might sometime be
able to declare himself openly.''
``But if he is anywhere, some one--some Samavian--ought to go and
look for him. It ought to be a Samavian who is very clever and a
patriot--'' He stopped at a flash of recognition. ``Father!''
he cried out. ``Father! You--you are the one who could find him
if any one in the world could. But perhaps--'' and he stopped a
moment again because new thoughts rushed through his mind.
``Have YOU ever looked for him?'' he asked hesitating.
Perhaps he had asked a stupid question--perhaps his father had
always been looking for him, perhaps that was his secret and his
work.
But Loristan did not look as if he thought him stupid. Quite the
contrary. He kept his handsome eyes fixed on him still in that
curious way, as if he were studying him--as if he were much more
than twelve years old, and he were deciding to tell him
something.
``Comrade at arms,'' he said, with the smile which always
gladdened Marco's heart, ``you have kept your oath of allegiance
like a man. You were not seven years old when you took it. You
are growing older. Silence is still the order, but you are man
enough to be told more.'' He paused and looked down, and then
looked up again, speaking in a low tone. ``I have not looked for
him,'' he said, ``because--I believe I know where he is.''
Marco caught his breath.
``Father!'' He said only that word. He could say no more. He
knew he must not ask questions. ``Silence is still the order.''
But as they faced each other in their dingy room at the back of
the shabby house on the side of the roaring common road--as
Lazarus stood stock- still behind his father's chair and kept his
eyes fixed on the empty coffee cups and the dry bread plate, and
everything looked as poor as things always did--there was a king
of Samavia--an Ivor Fedorovitch with the blood of the Lost Prince
in his veins--alive in some town or city this moment! And
Marco's own father knew where he was!
He glanced at Lazarus, but, though the old soldier's face looked
as expressionless as if it were cut out of wood, Marco realized
that he knew this thing and had always known it. He had been a
comrade at arms all his life. He continued to stare at the bread
plate.
Loristan spoke again and in an even lower voice. ``The Samavians
who are patriots and thinkers,'' he said, ``formed themselves
into a secret party about eighty years ago. They formed it when
they had no reason for hope, but they formed it because one of
them discovered that an Ivor Fedorovitch was living. He was head
forester on a great estate in the Austrian Alps. The nobleman he
served had always thought him a mystery because he had the
bearing and speech of a man who had not been born a servant, and
his methods in caring for the forests and game were those of a
man who was educated and had studied his subject. But he never
was familiar or assuming, and never professed superiority over
any of his fellows. He was a man of great stature, and was
extraordinarily brave and silent. The nobleman who was his
master made a sort of companion of him when they hunted together.
Once he took him with him when he traveled to Samavia to hunt
wild horses. He found that he knew the country strangely well,
and that he was familiar with Samavian hunting and customs.
Before he returned to Austria, the man obtained permission to go
to the mountains alone. He went among the shepherds and made
friends among them, asking many questions.
One night around a forest fire he heard the songs about the Lost
Prince which had not been forgotten even after nearly five
hundred years had passed. The shepherds and herdsmen talked
about Prince Ivor, and told old stories about him, and related
the prophecy that he would come back and bring again Samavia's
good days. He might come only in the body of one of his
descendants, but it would be his spirit which came, because his
spirit would never cease to love Samavia. One very old shepherd
tottered to his feet and lifted his face to the myriad stars
bestrewn like jewels in the blue sky above the forest trees, and
he wept and prayed aloud that the great God would send their king
to them. And the stranger huntsman stood upright also and lifted
his face to the stars. And, though he said no word, the herdsman
nearest to him saw tears on his cheeks--great, heavy tears. The
next day, the stranger went to the monastery where the order of
good monks lived who had taken care of the Lost Prince. When he
had left Samavia, the secret society was formed, and the members
of it knew that an Ivor Fedorovitch had passed through his
ancestors' country as the servant of another man. But the secret
society was only a small one, and, though it has been growing
ever since and it has done good deeds and good work in secret,
the huntsman died an old man before it was strong enough even to
dare to tell Samavia what it knew.''
``Had he a son?'' cried Marco. ``Had he a son?''
``Yes. He had a son. His name was Ivor. And he was trained as
I told you. That part I knew to be true, though I should have
believed it was true even if I had not known. There has ALWAYS
been a king ready for Samavia--even when he has labored with his
hands and served others. Each one took the oath of allegiance.''
``As I did?'' said Marco, breathless with excitement. When one
is twelve years old, to be so near a Lost Prince who might end
wars is a thrilling thing.
``The same,'' answered Loristan.
Marco threw up his hand in salute.
`` `Here grows a man for Samavia! God be thanked!' '' he quoted.
``And HE is somewhere? And you know?''
Loristan bent his head in acquiescence.
``For years much secret work has been done, and the Fedorovitch
party has grown until it is much greater and more powerful than
the other parties dream. The larger countries are tired of the
constant war and disorder in Samavia. Their interests are
disturbed by them, and they are deciding that they must have
peace and laws which can be counted on. There have been Samavian
patriots who have spent their lives in trying to bring this about
by making friends in the most powerful capitals, and working
secretly for the future good of their own land. Because Samavia
is so small and uninfluential, it has taken a long time but when
King Maran and his family were assassinated and the war broke
out, there were great powers which began to say that if some king
of good blood and reliable characteristics were given the crown,
he should be upheld.''
``HIS blood,''-- Marco's intensity made his voice drop almost to
a whisper,--``HIS blood has been trained for five hundred years,
Father! If it comes true--'' though he laughed a little, he was
obliged to wink his eyes hard because suddenly he felt tears rush
into them, which no boy likes--``the shepherds will have to make
a new song --it will have to be a shouting one about a prince
going away and a king coming back!''
``They are a devout people and observe many an ancient rite and
ceremony. They will chant prayers and burn altar-fires on their
mountain sides,'' Loristan said. ``But the end is not yet--the
end is not yet. Sometimes it seems that perhaps it is near--but
God knows!''
Then there leaped back upon Marco the story he had to tell, but
which he had held back for the last--the story of the man who
spoke Samavian and drove in the carriage with the King. He knew
now that it might mean some important thing which he could not
have before suspected.
``There is something I must tell you,'' he said.
He had learned to relate incidents in few but clear words when he
related them to his father. It had been part of his training.
Loristan had said that he might sometime have a story to tell
when he had but few moments to tell it in--some story which meant
life or death to some one. He told this one quickly and well.
He made Loristan see the well-dressed man with the deliberate
manner and the keen eyes, and he made him hear his voice when he
said, ``Tell your father that you are a very well-trained lad.''
``I am glad he said that. He is a man who knows what training
is,'' said Loristan. ``He is a person who knows what all Europe
is doing, and almost all that it will do. He is an ambassador
from a powerful and great country. If he saw that you are a
well-trained and fine lad, it might--it might even be good for
Samavia.''
``Would it matter that _I_ was well-trained? COULD it matter to
Samavia?'' Marco cried out.
Loristan paused for a moment--watching him gravely--looking him
over--his big, well-built boy's frame, his shabby clothes, and
his eagerly burning eyes.
He smiled one of his slow wonderful smiles.
``Yes. It might even matter to Samavia!'' he answered.
VI
THE DRILL AND THE SECRET PARTY
Loristan did not forbid Marco to pursue his acquaintance with The
Rat and his followers.
``You will find out for yourself whether they are friends for you
or not,'' he said. ``You will know in a few days, and then you
can make your own decision. You have known lads in various
countries, and you are a good judge of them, I think. You will
soon see whether they are going to be MEN or mere rabble. The
Rat now--how does he strike you?''
And the handsome eyes held their keen look of questioning.
``He'd be a brave soldier if he could stand,'' said Marco,
thinking him over. ``But he might be cruel.''
``A lad who might make a brave soldier cannot be disdained, but a
man who is cruel is a fool. Tell him that from me,'' Loristan
answered. ``He wastes force--his own and the force of the one he
treats cruelly. Only a fool wastes force.''
``May I speak of you sometimes?'' asked Marco.
``Yes. You will know how. You will remember the things about
which silence is the order.''
``I never forget them,'' said Marco. ``I have been trying not
to, for such a long time.''
``You have succeeded well, Comrade!'' returned Loristan, from his
writing-table, to which he had gone and where he was turning over
papers.
A strong impulse overpowered the boy. He marched over to the
table and stood very straight, making his soldierly young salute,
his whole body glowing.
``Father!'' he said, ``you don't know how I love you! I wish you
were a general and I might die in battle for you. When I look at
you, I long and long to do something for you a boy could not do.
I would die of a thousand wounds rather than disobey you--or
Samavia!''
He seized Loristan's hand, and knelt on one knee and kissed it.
An English or American boy could not have done such a thing from
unaffected natural impulse. But he was of warm Southern blood.
``I took my oath of allegiance to you, Father, when I took it to
Samavia. It seems as if you were Samavia, too,'' he said, and
kissed his hand again.
Loristan had turned toward him with one of the movements which
were full of dignity and grace. Marco, looking up at him, felt
that there was always a certain remote stateliness in him which
made it seem quite natural that any one should bend the knee and
kiss his hand.
A sudden great tenderness glowed in his father's face as he
raised the boy and put his hand on his shoulder.
``Comrade,'' he said, ``you don't know how much I love you--and
what reason there is that we should love each other! You don't
know how I have been watching you, and thanking God each year
that here grew a man for Samavia. That I know you are--a MAN,
though you have lived but twelve years. Twelve years may grow a
man--or prove that a man will never grow, though a human thing he
may remain for ninety years. This year may be full of strange
things for both of us. We cannot know WHAT I may have to ask you
to do for me--and for Samavia. Perhaps such a thing as no
twelve-year- old boy has ever done before.''
``Every night and every morning,'' said Marco, ``I shall pray
that I may be called to do it, and that I may do it well.''
``You will do it well, Comrade, if you are called. That I could
make oath,'' Loristan answered him.
The Squad had collected in the inclosure behind the church when
Marco appeared at the arched end of the passage. The boys were
drawn up with their rifles, but they all wore a rather dogged and
sullen look. The explanation which darted into Marco's mind was
that this was because The Rat was in a bad humor. He sat
crouched together on his platform biting his nails fiercely, his
elbows on his updrawn knees, his face twisted into a hideous
scowl. He did not look around, or even look up from the cracked
flagstone of the pavement on which his eyes were fixed.
Marco went forward with military step and stopped opposite to him
with prompt salute.
``Sorry to be late, sir,'' he said, as if he had been a private
speaking to his colonel.
``It's 'im, Rat! 'E's come, Rat!'' the Squad shouted. ``Look at
'im!''
But The Rat would not look, and did not even move.
``What's the matter?'' said Marco, with less ceremony than a
private would have shown. ``There's no use in my coming here if
you don't want me.''
`` 'E's got a grouch on 'cos you're late!'' called out the head
of the line. ``No doin' nothin' when 'e's got a grouch on.''
``I sha'n't try to do anything,'' said Marco, his boy-face
setting itself into good stubborn lines. ``That's not what I
came here for. I came to drill. I've been with my father. He
comes first. I can't join the Squad if he doesn't come first.
We're not on active service, and we're not in barracks.''
Then The Rat moved sharply and turned to look at him.
``I thought you weren't coming at all!'' he snapped and growled
at once. ``My father said you wouldn't. He said you were a
young swell for all your patched clothes. He said your father
would think he was a swell, even if he was only a penny-a-liner
on newspapers, and he wouldn't let you have anything to do with a
vagabond and a nuisance. Nobody begged you to join. Your father
can go to blazes!''
``Don't you speak in that way about my father,'' said Marco,
quite quietly, ``because I can't knock you down.''
``I'll get up and let you!'' began The Rat, immediately white and
raging. ``I can stand up with two sticks. I'll get up and let
you!''
``No, you won't,'' said Marco. ``If you want to know what my
father said, I can tell you. He said I could come as often as I
liked --till I found out whether we should be friends or not. He
says I shall find that out for myself.''
It was a strange thing The Rat did. It must always be remembered
of him that his wretched father, who had each year sunk lower and
lower in the under-world, had been a gentleman once, a man who
had been familiar with good manners and had been educated in the
customs of good breeding. Sometimes when he was drunk, and
sometimes when he was partly sober, he talked to The Rat of many
things the boy would otherwise never have heard of. That was why
the lad was different from the other vagabonds. This, also, was
why he suddenly altered the whole situation by doing this strange
and unexpected thing. He utterly changed his expression and
voice, fixing his sharp eyes shrewdly on Marco's. It was almost
as if he were asking him a conundrum. He knew it would have been
one to most boys of the class he appeared outwardly to belong to.
He would either know the answer or he wouldn't.
``I beg your pardon,'' The Rat said.
That was the conundrum. It was what a gentleman and an officer
would have said, if he felt he had been mistaken or rude. He had
heard that from his drunken father.
``I beg yours--for being late,'' said Marco.
That was the right answer. It was the one another officer and
gentleman would have made. It settled the matter at once, and it
settled more than was apparent at the moment. It decided that
Marco was one of those who knew the things The Rat's father had
once known--the things gentlemen do and say and think. Not
another word was said. It was all right. Marco slipped into
line with the Squad, and The Rat sat erect with his military
bearing and began his drill:
``Squad!
`` 'Tention!
``Number!
``Slope arms!
``Form fours!
``Right!
``Quick march!
``Halt!
``Left turn!
``Order arms!
``Stand at ease!
``Stand easy!''
They did it so well that it was quite wonderful when one
considered the limited space at their disposal. They had
evidently done it often, and The Rat had been not only a smart,
but a severe, officer. This morning they repeated the exercise a
number of times, and even varied it with Review Drill, with which
they seemed just as familiar.
``Where did you learn it?'' The Rat asked, when the arms were
stacked again and Marco was sitting by him as he had sat the
previous day.
``From an old soldier. And I like to watch it, as you do.''
``If you were a young swell in the Guards, you couldn't be
smarter at it,'' The Rat said. ``The way you hold yourself! The
way you stand! You've got it! Wish I was you! It comes natural
to you.''
``I've always liked to watch it and try to do it myself. I did
when I was a little fellow,'' answered Marco.
``I've been trying to kick it into these chaps for more than a
year,'' said The Rat. ``A nice job I had of it! It nearly made
me sick at first.''
The semicircle in front of him only giggled or laughed outright.
The members of it seemed to take very little offense at his
cavalier treatment of them. He had evidently something to give
them which was entertaining enough to make up for his tyranny and
indifference. He thrust his hand into one of the pockets of his
ragged coat, and drew out a piece of newspaper.
``My father brought home this, wrapped round a loaf of bread,''
he said. ``See what it says there!''
He handed it to Marco, pointing to some words printed in large
letters at the head of a column. Marco looked at it and sat very
still.
The words he read were: ``The Lost Prince.''
``Silence is still the order,'' was the first thought which
flashed through his mind. ``Silence is still the order.''
``What does it mean?'' he said aloud.
``There isn't much of it. I wish there was more,'' The Rat said
fretfully. ``Read and see. Of course they say it mayn't be
true--but I believe it is. They say that people think some one
knows where he is--at least where one of his descendants is.
It'd be the same thing. He'd be the real king. If he'd just
show himself, it might stop all the fighting. Just read.''
Marco read, and his skin prickled as the blood went racing
through his body. But his face did not change. There was a
sketch of the story of the Lost Prince to begin with. It had
been regarded by most people, the article said, as a sort of
legend. Now there was a definite rumor that it was not a legend
at all, but a part of the long past history of Samavia. It was
said that through the centuries there had always been a party
secretly loyal to the memory of this worshiped and lost
Fedorovitch. It was even said that from father to son,
generation after generation after generation, had descended the
oath of fealty to him and his descendants. The people had made
a god of him, and now, romantic as it seemed, it was beginning to
be an open secret that some persons believed that a descendant
had been found--a Fedorovitch worthy of his young ancestor--and
that a certain Secret Party also held that, if he were called
back to the throne of Samavia, the interminable wars and
bloodshed would reach an end.
The Rat had begun to bite his nails fast.
``Do you believe he's found?'' he asked feverishly. ``DON'T YOU?
I do!''
``I wonder where he is, if it's true? I wonder! Where?''
exclaimed Marco. He could say that, and he might seem as eager
as he felt.
The Squad all began to jabber at once. ``Yus, where wos'e?
There is no knowin'. It'd be likely to be in some o' these
furrin places. England'd be too far from Samavia. 'Ow far off
wos Samavia? Wos it in Roosha, or where the Frenchies were, or
the Germans? But wherever 'e wos, 'e'd be the right sort, an'
'e'd be the sort a chap'd turn and look at in the street.''
The Rat continued to bite his nails.
``He might be anywhere,'' he said, his small fierce face glowing.
``That's what I like to think about. He might be passing in the
street outside there; he might be up in one of those houses,''
jerking his head over his shoulder toward the backs of the
inclosing dwellings. ``Perhaps he knows he's a king, and perhaps
he doesn't. He'd know if what you said yesterday was true--about
the king always being made ready for Samavia.''
``Yes, he'd know,'' put in Marco.
``Well, it'd be finer if he did,'' went on The Rat. ``However
poor and shabby he was, he'd know the secret all the time. And
if people sneered at him, he'd sneer at them and laugh to
himself. I dare say he'd walk tremendously straight and hold his
head up. If I was him, I'd like to make people suspect a bit
that I wasn't like the common lot o' them.'' He put out his hand
and pushed Marco excitedly. ``Let's work out plots for him!'' he
said. ``That'd be a splendid game! Let's pretend we're the
Secret Party!''
He was tremendously excited. Out of the ragged pocket he fished
a piece of chalk. Then he leaned forward and began to draw
something quickly on the flagstones closest to his platform. The
Squad leaned forward also, quite breathlessly, and Marco leaned
forward. The chalk was sketching a roughly outlined map, and he
knew what map it was, before The Rat spoke.
``That's a map of Samavia,'' he said. ``It was in that piece of
magazine I told you about--the one where I read about Prince
Ivor. I studied it until it fell to pieces. But I could draw it
myself by that time, so it didn't matter. I could draw it with
my eyes shut. That's the capital city,'' pointing to a spot.
``It's called Melzarr. The palace is there. It's the place
where the first of the Maranovitch killed the last of the
Fedorovitch--the bad chap that was Ivor's father. It's the
palace Ivor wandered out of singing the shepherds' song that
early morning. It's where the throne is that his descendant
would sit upon to be crowned--that he's GOING to sit upon. I
believe he is! Let's swear he shall!'' He flung down his piece
of chalk and sat up. ``Give me two sticks. Help me to get up.''
Two of the Squad sprang to their feet and came to him. Each
snatched one of the sticks from the stacked rifles, evidently
knowing what he wanted. Marco rose too, and watched with sudden,
keen curiosity. He had thought that The Rat could not stand up,
but it seemed that he could, in a fashion of his own, and he was
going to do it. The boys lifted him by his arms, set him against
the stone coping of the iron railings of the churchyard, and put
a stick in each of his hands. They stood at his side, but he
supported himself.
`` 'E could get about if 'e 'ad the money to buy crutches!'' said
one whose name was Cad, and he said it quite proudly. The queer
thing that Marco had noticed was that the ragamuffins were proud
of The Rat, and regarded him as their lord and master. ``--'E
could get about an' stand as well as any one,'' added the other,
and he said it in the tone of one who boasts. His name was Ben.
``I'm going to stand now, and so are the rest of you,'' said The
Rat. ``Squad! 'Tention! You at the head of the line,'' to
Marco. They were in line in a moment--straight, shoulders back,
chins up. And Marco stood at the head.
``We're going to take an oath,'' said The Rat. ``It's an oath of
allegiance. Allegiance means faithfulness to a thing--a king or
a country. Ours means allegiance to the King of Samavia. We
don't know where he is, but we swear to be faithful to him, to
fight for him, to plot for him, to DIE for him, and to bring him
back to his throne!'' The way in which he flung up his head when
he said the word ``die'' was very fine indeed. ``We are the
Secret Party. We will work in the dark and find out things--and
run risks--and collect an army no one will know anything about
until it is strong enough to suddenly rise at a secret signal,
and overwhelm the Maranovitch and Iarovitch, and seize their
forts and citadels. No one even knows we are alive. We are a
silent, secret thing that never speaks aloud!''
Silent and secret as they were, however, they spoke aloud at this
juncture. It was such a grand idea for a game, and so full of
possible larks, that the Squad broke into a howl of an exultant
cheer.
``Hooray!'' they yelled. ``Hooray for the oath of 'legiance!
'Ray! 'ray! 'ray!''
``Shut up, you swine!'' shouted The Rat. ``Is that the way you
keep yourself secret? You'll call the police in, you fools!
Look at HIM!'' pointing to Marco. ``He's got some sense.''
Marco, in fact, had not made any sound.
``Come here, you Cad and Ben, and put me back on my wheels,''
raged the Squad's commander. ``I'll not make up the game at all.
It's no use with a lot of fat-head, raw recruits like you.''
The line broke and surrounded him in a moment, pleading and
urging.
``Aw, Rat! We forgot. It's the primest game you've ever thought
out! Rat! Rat! Don't get a grouch on! We'll keep still, Rat!
Primest lark of all 'll be the sneakin' about an' keepin' quiet.
Aw, Rat! Keep it up!''
``Keep it up yourselves!'' snarled The Rat.
``Not another cove of us could do it but you! Not one! There's
no other cove could think it out. You're the only chap that can
think out things. You thought out the Squad! That's why you're
captain!''
This was true. He was the one who could invent entertainment for
them, these street lads who had nothing. Out of that nothing he
could create what excited them, and give them something to fill
empty, useless, often cold or wet or foggy, hours. That made him
their captain and their pride.
The Rat began to yield, though grudgingly. He pointed again to
Marco, who had not moved, but stood still at attention.
``Look at HIM!'' he said. ``He knows enough to stand where he's
put until he's ordered to break line. He's a soldier, he is--not
a raw recruit that don't know the goose-step. He's been in
barracks before.''
But after this outburst, he deigned to go on.
``Here's the oath,'' he said. ``We swear to stand any torture
and submit in silence to any death rather than betray our secret
and our king. We will obey in silence and in secret. We will
swim through seas of blood and fight our way through lakes of
fire, if we are ordered. Nothing shall bar our way. All we do
and say and think is for our country and our king. If any of you
have anything to say, speak out before you take the oath.''
He saw Marco move a little, and he made a sign to him.
``You,'' he said. ``Have you something to say?''
Marco turned to him and saluted.
``Here stand ten men for Samavia. God be thanked!'' he said. He
dared say that much, and he felt as if his father himself would
have told him that they were the right words.
The Rat thought they were. Somehow he felt that they struck
home. He reddened with a sudden emotion.
``Squad!'' he said. ``I'll let you give three cheers on that.
It's for the last time. We'll begin to be quiet afterward.''
And to the Squad's exultant relief he led the cheer, and they
were allowed to make as much uproar as they liked. They liked to
make a great deal, and when it was at an end, it had done them
good and made them ready for business.
The Rat opened the drama at once. Never surely had there ever
before been heard a conspirator's whisper as hollow as his.
``Secret Ones,'' he said, ``it is midnight. We meet in the
depths of darkness. We dare not meet by day. When we meet in
the daytime, we pretend not to know each other. We are meeting
now in a Samavian city where there is a fortress. We shall have
to take it when the secret sign is given and we make our rising.
We are getting everything ready, so that, when we find the king,
the secret sign can be given.''
``What is the name of the city we are in?'' whispered Cad.
``It is called Larrina. It is an important seaport. We must
take it as soon as we rise. The next time we meet I will bring a
dark lantern and draw a map and show it to you.''
It would have been a great advantage to the game if Marco could
have drawn for them the map he could have made, a map which would
have shown every fortress--every stronghold and every weak place.
Being a boy, he knew what excitement would have thrilled each
breast, how they would lean forward and pile question on
question, pointing to this place and to that. He had learned to
draw the map before he was ten, and he had drawn it again and
again because there had been times when his father had told him
that changes had taken place. Oh, yes! he could have drawn a map
which would have moved them to a frenzy of joy. But he sat
silent and listened, only speaking when he asked a question, as
if he knew nothing more about Samavia than The Rat did. What a
Secret Party they were! They drew themselves together in the
closest of circles; they spoke in unearthly whispers.
``A sentinel ought to be posted at the end of the passage,''
Marco whispered.
``Ben, take your gun!'' commanded The Rat.
Ben rose stealthily, and, shouldering his weapon, crept on tiptoe
to the opening. There he stood on guard.
``My father says there's been a Secret Party in Samavia for a
hundred years,'' The Rat whispered.
``Who told him?'' asked Marco.
``A man who has been in Samavia,'' answered The Rat. ``He said
it was the most wonderful Secret Party in the world, because it
has worked and waited so long, and never given up, though it has
had no reason for hoping. It began among some shepherds and
charcoal-burners who bound themselves by an oath to find the Lost
Prince and bring him back to the throne. There were too few of
them to do anything against the Maranovitch, and when the first
lot found they were growing old, they made their sons take the
same oath. It has been passed on from generation to generation,
and in each generation the band has grown. No one really knows
how large it is now, but they say that there are people in nearly
all the countries in Europe who belong to it in dead secret, and
are sworn to help it when they are called. They are only
waiting. Some are rich people who will give money, and some are
poor ones who will slip across the frontier to fight or to help
to smuggle in arms. They even say that for all these years there
have been arms made in caves in the mountains, and hidden there
year after year. There are men who are called Forgers of the
Sword, and they, and their fathers, and grandfathers, and
great-grandfathers have always made swords and stored them in
caverns no one knows of, hidden caverns underground.''
Marco spoke aloud the thought which had come into his mind as he
listened, a thought which brought fear to him. ``If the people
in the streets talk about it, they won't be hidden long.''
``It isn't common talk, my father says. Only very few have
guessed, and most of them think it is part of the Lost Prince
legend,'' said The Rat. ``The Maranovitch and Iarovitch laugh at
it. They have always been great fools. They're too full of
their own swagger to think anything can interfere with them.''
``Do you talk much to your father?'' Marco asked him.
The Rat showed his sharp white teeth in a grin.
``I know what you're thinking of,'' he said. ``You're
remembering that I said he was always drunk. So he is, except
when he's only HALF drunk. And when he's HALF drunk, he's the
most splendid talker in London. He remembers everything he has
ever learned or read or heard since he was born. I get him going
and listen. He wants to talk and I want to hear. I found out
almost everything I know in that way. He didn't know he was
teaching me, but he was. He goes back into being a gentleman
when he's half drunk.''
``If--if you care about the Samavians, you'd better ask him not
to tell people about the Secret Party and the Forgers of the
Sword,'' suggested Marco.
The Rat started a little.
``That's true!'' he said. ``You're sharper than I am. It
oughtn't to be blabbed about, or the Maranovitch might hear
enough to make them stop and listen. I'll get him to promise.
There's one queer thing about him,'' he added very slowly, as if
he were thinking it over, ``I suppose it's part of the gentleman
that's left in him. If he makes a promise, he never breaks it,
drunk or sober.''
``Ask him to make one,'' said Marco. The next moment he changed
the subject because it seemed the best thing to do. ``Go on and
tell us what our own Secret Party is to do. We're forgetting,''
he whispered.
The Rat took up his game with renewed keenness. It was a game
which attracted him immensely because it called upon his
imagination and held his audience spellbound, besides plunging
him into war and strategy.
``We're preparing for the rising,'' he said. ``It must come
soon. We've waited so long. The caverns are stacked with arms.
The Maranovitch and the Iarovitch are fighting and using all
their soldiers, and now is our time.'' He stopped and thought,
his elbows on his knees. He began to bite his nails again.
``The Secret Signal must be given,'' he said. Then he stopped
again, and the Squad held its breath and pressed nearer with a
softly shuffling sound. ``Two of the Secret Ones must be chosen
by lot and sent forth,'' he went on; and the Squad almost brought
ruin and disgrace upon itself by wanting to cheer again, and only
just stopping itself in time. ``Must be chosen BY LOT,'' The Rat
repeated, looking from one face to another. ``Each one will take
his life in his hand when he goes forth. He may have to die a
thousand deaths, but he must go. He must steal in silence and
disguise from one country to another. Wherever there is one of
the Secret Party, whether he is in a hovel or on a throne, the
messengers must go to him in darkness and stealth and give him
the sign. It will mean, `The hour has come. God save Samavia!'
''
``God save Samavia!'' whispered the Squad, excitedly. And,
because they saw Marco raise his hand to his forehead, every one
of them saluted.
They all began to whisper at once.
``Let's draw lots now. Let's draw lots, Rat. Don't let's 'ave
no waitin'.''
The Rat began to look about him with dread anxiety. He seemed to
be examining the sky.
``The darkness is not as thick as it was,'' he whispered.
``Midnight has passed. The dawn of day will be upon us. If any
one has a piece of paper or a string, we will draw the lots
before we part.''
Cad had a piece of string, and Marco had a knife which could be
used to cut it into lengths. This The Rat did himself. Then,
after shutting his eyes and mixing them, he held them in his hand
ready for the drawing.
``The Secret One who draws the longest lot is chosen. The Secret
One who draws the shortest is chosen,'' he said solemnly.
The drawing was as solemn as his tone. Each boy wanted to draw
either the shortest lot or the longest one. The heart of each
thumped somewhat as he drew his piece of string.
When the drawing was at an end, each showed his lot. The Rat had
drawn the shortest piece of string, and Marco had drawn the
longest one.
``Comrade!'' said The Rat, taking his hand. ``We will face death
and danger together!''
``God save Samavia!'' answered Marco.
And the game was at an end for the day. The primest thing, the
Squad said, The Rat had ever made up for them. `` 'E wos a
wonder, he wos!''
VII
``THE LAMP IS LIGHTED!''
On his way home, Marco thought of nothing but the story he must
tell his father, the story the stranger who had been to Samavia
had told The Rat's father. He felt that it must be a true story
and not merely an invention. The Forgers of the Sword must be
real men, and the hidden subterranean caverns stacked through the
centuries with arms must be real, too. And if they were real,
surely his father was one of those who knew the secret. His
thoughts ran very fast. The Rat's boyish invention of the rising
was only part of a game, but how natural it would be that
sometime--perhaps before long--there would be a real rising!
Surely there would be one if the Secret Party had grown so
strong, and if many weapons and secret friends in other
countries were ready and waiting. During all these years, hidden
work and preparation would have been going on continually, even
though it was preparation for an unknown day. A party which had
lasted so long--which passed its oath on from generation to
generation--must be of a deadly determination.
What might it not have made ready in its caverns and secret
meeting- places! He longed to reach home and tell his father, at
once, all he had heard. He recalled to mind, word for word, all
that The Rat had been told, and even all he had added in his
game, because-- well, because that seemed so real too, so real
that it actually might be useful.
But when he reached No. 7 Philibert Place, he found Loristan and
Lazarus very much absorbed in work. The door of the back
sitting-room was locked when he first knocked on it, and locked
again as soon as he had entered. There were many papers on the
table, and they were evidently studying them. Several of them
were maps. Some were road maps, some maps of towns and cities,
and some of fortifications; but they were all maps of places in
Samavia. They were usually kept in a strong box, and when they
were taken out to be studied, the door was always kept locked.
Before they had their evening meal, these were all returned to
the strong box, which was pushed into a corner and had newspapers
piled upon it.
``When he arrives,'' Marco heard Loristan say to Lazarus, ``we
can show him clearly what has been planned. He can see for
himself.''
His father spoke scarcely at all during the meal, and, though it
was not the habit of Lazarus to speak at such times unless spoken
to, this evening it seemed to Marco that he LOOKED more silent
than he had ever seen him look before. They were plainly both
thinking anxiously of deeply serious things. The story of the
stranger who had been to Samavia must not be told yet. But it
was one which would keep.
Loristan did not say anything until Lazarus had removed the
things from the table and made the room as neat as possible.
While that was being done, he sat with his forehead resting on
his hand, as if absorbed in thought. Then he made a gesture to
Marco.
``Come here, Comrade,'' he said.
Marco went to him.
``To-night some one may come to talk with me about grave
things,'' he said. ``I think he will come, but I cannot be quite
sure. It is important that he should know that, when he comes,
he will find me quite alone. He will come at a late hour, and
Lazarus will open the door quietly that no one may hear. It is
important that no one should see him. Some one must go and walk
on the opposite side of the street until he appears. Then the
one who goes to give warning must cross the pavement before him
and say in a low voice, `The Lamp is lighted!' and at once turn
quietly away.''
What boy's heart would not have leaped with joy at the mystery of
it! Even a common and dull boy who knew nothing of Samavia would
have felt jerky. Marco's voice almost shook with the thrill of
his feeling.
``How shall I know him?'' he said at once. Without asking at
all, he knew he was the ``some one'' who was to go.
``You have seen him before,'' Loristan answered. ``He is the man
who drove in the carriage with the King.''
``I shall know him,'' said Marco. ``When shall I go?''
``Not until it is half-past one o'clock. Go to bed and sleep
until Lazarus calls you.'' Then he added, ``Look well at his
face before you speak. He will probably not be dressed as well
as he was when you saw him first.''
Marco went up-stairs to his room and went to bed as he was told,
but it was hard to go to sleep. The rattle and roaring of the
road did not usually keep him awake, because he had lived in the
poorer quarter of too many big capital cities not to be
accustomed to noise. But to-night it seemed to him that, as he
lay and looked out at the lamplight, he heard every bus and cab
which went past. He could not help thinking of the people who
were in them, and on top of them, and of the people who were
hurrying along on the pavement outside the broken iron railings.
He was wondering what they would think if they knew that things
connected with the battles they read of in the daily papers were
going on in one of the shabby houses they scarcely gave a glance
to as they went by them. It must be something connected with the
war, if a man who was a great diplomat and the companion of kings
came in secret to talk alone with a patriot who was a Samavian.
Whatever his father was doing was for the good of Samavia, and
perhaps the Secret Party knew he was doing it. His heart almost
beat aloud under his shirt as he lay on the lumpy mattress
thinking it over. He must indeed look well at the stranger
before he even moved toward him. He must be sure he was the
right man. The game he had amused himself with so long--the game
of trying to remember pictures and people and places clearly and
in detail--had been a wonderful training. If he could draw, he
knew he could have made a sketch of the keen-eyed, clever,
aquiline face with the well-cut and delicately close mouth, which
looked as if it had been shut upon secrets always--always. If he
could draw, he found himself saying again. He COULD draw, though
perhaps only roughly. He had often amused himself by making
sketches of things he wanted to ask questions about. He had even
drawn people's faces in his untrained way, and his father had
said that he had a crude gift for catching a likeness. Perhaps
he could make a sketch of this face which would show his father
that he knew and would recognize it.
He jumped out of bed and went to a table near the window. There
was paper and a pencil lying on it. A street lamp exactly
opposite threw into the room quite light enough for him to see
by. He half knelt by the table and began to draw. He worked for
about twenty minutes steadily, and he tore up two or three
unsatisfactory sketches. The poor drawing would not matter if he
could catch that subtle look which was not slyness but something
more dignified and important. It was not difficult to get the
marked, aristocratic outline of the features. A common-looking
man with less pronounced profile would have been less easy to
draw in one sense. He gave his mind wholly to the recalling of
every detail which had photographed itself on his memory through
its trained habit. Gradually he saw that the likeness was
becoming clearer. It was not long before it was clear enough to
be a striking one. Any one who knew the man would recognize it.
He got up, drawing a long and joyful breath.
He did not put on his shoes, but crossed his room as noiselessly
as possible, and as noiselessly opened the door. He made no
ghost of a sound when he went down the stairs. The woman who
kept the lodging-house had gone to bed, and so had the other
lodgers and the maid of all work. All the lights were out except
the one he saw a glimmer of under the door of his father's room.
When he had been a mere baby, he had been taught to make a
special sign on the door when he wished to speak to Loristan. He
stood still outside the back sitting-room and made it now. It
was a low scratching sound--two scratches and a soft tap.
Lazarus opened the door and looked troubled.
``It is not yet time, sir,'' he said very low.
``I know,'' Marco answered. ``But I must show something to my
father.'' Lazarus let him in, and Loristan turned round from his
writing-table questioningly.
Marco went forward and laid the sketch down before him.
``Look at it,'' he said. ``I remember him well enough to draw
that. I thought of it all at once--that I could make a sort of
picture. Do you think it is like him?'' Loristan examined it
closely.
``It is very like him,'' he answered. ``You have made me feel
entirely safe. Thanks, Comrade. It was a good idea.''
There was relief in the grip he gave the boy's hand, and Marco
turned away with an exultant feeling. Just as he reached the
door, Loristan said to him:
``Make the most of this gift. It is a gift. And it is true your
mind has had good training. The more you draw, the better. Draw
everything you can.''
Neither the street lamps, nor the noises, nor his thoughts kept
Marco awake when he went back to bed. But before he settled
himself upon his pillow he gave himself certain orders. He had
both read, and heard Loristan say, that the mind can control the
body when people once find out that it can do so. He had tried
experiments himself, and had found out some curious things. One
was that if he told himself to remember a certain thing at a
certain time, he usually found that he DID remember it.
Something in his brain seemed to remind him. He had often tried
the experiment of telling himself to awaken at a particular hour,
and had awakened almost exactly at the moment by the clock.
``I will sleep until one o'clock,'' he said as he shut his eyes.
``Then I will awaken and feel quite fresh. I shall not be sleepy
at all.''
He slept as soundly as a boy can sleep. And at one o'clock
exactly he awakened, and found the street lamp still throwing its
light through the window. He knew it was one o'clock, because
there was a cheap little round clock on the table, and he could
see the time. He was quite fresh and not at all sleepy. His
experiment had succeeded again.
He got up and dressed. Then he went down-stairs as noiselessly
as before. He carried his shoes in his hands, as he meant to put
them on only when he reached the street. He made his sign at his
father's door, and it was Loristan who opened it.
``Shall I go now?'' Marco asked.
``Yes. Walk slowly to the other side of the street. Look in
every direction. We do not know where he will come from. After
you have given him the sign, then come in and go to bed again.''
Marco saluted as a soldier would have done on receiving an order.
Then, without a second's delay, he passed noiselessly out of the
house.
Loristan turned back into the room and stood silently in the
center of it. The long lines of his handsome body looked
particularly erect and stately, and his eyes were glowing as if
something deeply moved him.
``There grows a man for Samavia,'' he said to Lazarus, who
watched him. ``God be thanked!''
Lazarus's voice was low and hoarse, and he saluted quite
reverently.
``Your--sir!'' he said. ``God save the Prince!''
``Yes,'' Loristan answered, after a moment's hesitation,--``when
he is found.'' And he went back to his table smiling his
beautiful smile.
The wonder of silence in the deserted streets of a great city,
after midnight has hushed all the roar and tumult to rest, is an
almost unbelievable thing. The stillness in the depths of a
forest or on a mountain top is not so strange. A few hours ago,
the tumult was rushing past; in a few hours more, it will be
rushing past again.
But now the street is a naked thing; a distant policeman's tramp
on the bare pavement has a hollow and almost fearsome sound. It
seemed especially so to Marco as he crossed the road. Had it
ever been so empty and deadly silent before? Was it so every
night? Perhaps it was, when he was fast asleep on his lumpy
mattress with the light from a street lamp streaming into the
room. He listened for the step of the policeman on night-watch,
because he did not wish to be seen. There was a jutting wall
where he could stand in the shadow while the man passed. A
policeman would stop to look questioningly at a boy who walked up
and down the pavement at half-past one in the morning. Marco
could wait until he had gone by, and then come out into the light
and look up and down the road and the cross streets.
He heard his approaching footsteps in a few minutes, and was
safely in the shadows before he could be seen. When the
policeman passed, he came out and walked slowly down the road,
looking on each side, and now and then looking back. At first no
one was in sight. Then a late hansom-cab came tinkling along.
But the people in it were returning from some festivity, and were
laughing and talking, and noticed nothing but their own joking.
Then there was silence again, and for a long time, as it seemed
to Marco, no one was to be seen. It was not really so long as it
appeared, because he was anxious. Then a very early
vegetable-wagon on the way from the country to Covent Garden
Market came slowly lumbering by with its driver almost asleep on
his piles of potatoes and cabbages. After it had passed, there
was stillness and emptiness once more, until the policeman showed
himself again on his beat, and Marco slipped into the shadow of
the wall as he had done before.
When he came out into the light, he had begun to hope that the
time would not seem long to his father. It had not really been
long, he told himself, it had only seemed so. But his father's
anxiousness would be greater than his own could be. Loristan
knew all that depended on the coming of this great man who sat
side by side with a king in his carriage and talked to him as if
he knew him well.
``It might be something which all Samavia is waiting to know-- at
least all the Secret Party,'' Marco thought. ``The Secret Party
is Samavia,''--he started at the sound of footsteps. ``Some one
is coming!'' he said. ``It is a man.''
It was a man who was walking up the road on the same side of the
pavement as his own. Marco began to walk toward him quietly but
rather rapidly. He thought it might be best to appear as if he
were some boy sent on a midnight errand--perhaps to call a
doctor. Then, if it was a stranger he passed, no suspicion would
be aroused. Was this man as tall as the one who had driven with
the King? Yes, he was about the same height, but he was too far
away to be recognizable otherwise. He drew nearer, and Marco
noticed that he also seemed slightly to hasten his footsteps.
Marco went on. A little nearer, and he would be able to make
sure. Yes, now he was near enough. Yes, this man was the same
height and not unlike in figure, but he was much younger. He was
not the one who had been in the carriage with His Majesty. He
was not more than thirty years old. He began swinging his cane
and whistling a music-hall song softly as Marco passed him
without changing his pace.
It was after the policeman had walked round his beat and
disappeared for the third time, that Marco heard footsteps
echoing at some distance down a cross street. After listening to
make sure that they were approaching instead of receding in
another direction, he placed himself at a point where he could
watch the length of the thoroughfare. Yes, some one was coming.
It was a man's figure again. He was able to place himself rather
in the shadow so that the person approaching would not see that
he was being watched. The solitary walker reached a recognizable
distance in about two minutes' time. He was dressed in an
ordinary shop-made suit of clothes which was rather shabby and
quite unnoticeable in its appearance. His common hat was worn so
that it rather shaded his face. But even before he had crossed
to Marco's side of the road, the boy had clearly recognized him.
It was the man who had driven with the King!
Chance was with Marco. The man crossed at exactly the place
which made it easy for the boy to step lightly from behind him,
walk a few paces by his side, and then pass directly before him
across the pavement, glancing quietly up into his face as he said
in a low voice but distinctly, the words ``The Lamp is lighted,''
and without pausing a second walk on his way down the road. He
did not slacken his pace or look back until he was some distance
away. Then he glanced over his shoulder, and saw that the figure
had crossed the street and was inside the railings. It was all
right. His father would not be disappointed. The great man had
come.
He walked for about ten minutes, and then went home and to bed.
But he was obliged to tell himself to go to sleep several times
before his eyes closed for the rest of the night.
VIII
AN EXCITING GAME
Loristan referred only once during the next day to what had
happened.
``You did your errand well. You were not hurried or nervous,''
he said. ``The Prince was pleased with your calmness.''
No more was said. Marco knew that the quiet mention of the
stranger's title had been made merely as a designation. If it
was necessary to mention him again in the future, he could be
referred to as ``the Prince.'' In various Continental countries
there were many princes who were not royal or even serene
highnesses--who were merely princes as other nobles were dukes or
barons. Nothing special was revealed when a man was spoken of as
a prince. But though nothing was said on the subject of the
incident, it was plain that much work was being done by Loristan
and Lazarus. The sitting- room door was locked, and the maps and
documents, usually kept in the iron box, were being used.
Marco went to the Tower of London and spent part of the day in
living again the stories which, centuries past, had been inclosed
within its massive and ancient stone walls. In this way, he had
throughout boyhood become intimate with people who to most boys
seemed only the unreal creatures who professed to be alive in
school- books of history. He had learned to know them as men and
women because he had stood in the palaces they had been born in
and had played in as children, had died in at the end. He had
seen the dungeons they had been imprisoned in, the blocks on
which they had laid their heads, the battlements on which they
had fought to defend their fortressed towers, the thrones they
had sat upon, the crowns they had worn, and the jeweled scepters
they had held. He had stood before their portraits and had gazed
curiously at their ``Robes of Investiture,'' sewn with tens of
thousands of seed-pearls. To look at a man's face and feel his
pictured eyes follow you as you move away from him, to see the
strangely splendid garments he once warmed with his living flesh,
is to realize that history is not a mere lesson in a school-book,
but is a relation of the life stories of men and women who saw
strange and splendid days, and sometimes suffered strange and
terrible things.
There were only a few people who were being led about sightseeing.
The man in the ancient Beef-eaters' costume, who was
their guide, was good-natured, and evidently fond of talking. He
was a big and stout man, with a large face and a small, merry
eye. He was rather like pictures of Henry the Eighth, himself,
which Marco remembered having seen. He was specially talkative
when he stood by the tablet that marks the spot where stood the
block on which Lady Jane Grey had laid her young head. One of
the sightseers who knew little of English history had asked some
questions about the reasons for her execution.
``If her father-in-law, the Duke of Northumberland, had left that
young couple alone--her and her husband, Lord Guildford Dudley
--they'd have kept their heads on. He was bound to make her a
queen, and Mary Tudor was bound to be queen herself. The duke
wasn't clever enough to manage a conspiracy and work up the
people. These Samavians we're reading about in the papers would
have done it better. And they're half-savages.''
``They had a big battle outside Melzarr yesterday,'' the
sight-seer standing next to Marco said to the young woman who was
his companion. ``Thousands of 'em killed. I saw it in big
letters on the boards as I rode on the top of the bus. They're
just slaughtering each other, that's what they're doing.''
The talkative Beef-eater heard him.
``They can't even bury their dead fast enough,'' he said.
``There'll be some sort of plague breaking out and sweeping into
the countries nearest them. It'll end by spreading all over
Europe as it did in the Middle Ages. What the civilized
countries have got to do is to make them choose a decent king and
begin to behave themselves.''
``I'll tell my father that too,'' Marco thought. ``It shows that
everybody is thinking and talking of Samavia, and that even the
common people know it must have a real king. This must be THE
TIME!'' And what he meant was that this must be the time for
which the Secret Party had waited and worked so long--the time
for the Rising. But his father was out when he went back to
Philibert Place, and Lazarus looked more silent than ever as he
stood behind his chair and waited on him through his
insignificant meal. However plain and scant the food they had to
eat, it was always served with as much care and ceremony as if it
had been a banquet.
``A man can eat dry bread and drink cold water as if he were a
gentleman,'' his father had said long ago. ``And it is easy to
form careless habits. Even if one is hungry enough to feel
ravenous, a man who has been well bred will not allow himself to
look so. A dog may, a man may not. Just as a dog may howl when
he is angry or in pain and a man may not.''
It was only one of the small parts of the training which had
quietly made the boy, even as a child, self-controlled and
courteous, had taught him ease and grace of boyish carriage, the
habit of holding his body well and his head erect, and had given
him a certain look of young distinction which, though it assumed
nothing, set him apart from boys of carelessly awkward bearing.
``Is there a newspaper here which tells of the battle, Lazarus?''
he asked, after he had left the table.
``Yes, sir,'' was the answer. ``Your father said that you might
read it. It is a black tale!'' he added, as he handed him the
paper.
It was a black tale. As he read, Marco felt as if he could
scarcely bear it. It was as if Samavia swam in blood, and as if
the other countries must stand aghast before such furious
cruelties.
``Lazarus,'' he said, springing to his feet at last, his eyes
burning, ``something must stop it! There must be something
strong enough.
The time has come. The time has come.'' And he walked up and
down the room because he was too excited to stand still.
How Lazarus watched him! What a strong and glowing feeling there
was in his own restrained face!
``Yes, sir. Surely the time has come,'' he answered. But that
was all he said, and he turned and went out of the shabby back
sitting- room at once. It was as if he felt it were wiser to go
before he lost power over himself and said more.
Marco made his way to the meeting-place of the Squad, to which
The Rat had in the past given the name of the Barracks. The Rat
was sitting among his followers, and he had been reading the
morning paper to them, the one which contained the account of the
battle of Melzarr. The Squad had become the Secret Party, and
each member of it was thrilled with the spirit of dark plot and
adventure. They all whispered when they spoke.
``This is not the Barracks now,'' The Rat said. ``It is a
subterranean cavern. Under the floor of it thousands of swords
and guns are buried, and it is piled to the roof with them.
There is only a small place left for us to sit and plot in. We
crawl in through a hole, and the hole is hidden by bushes.''
To the rest of the boys this was only an exciting game, but Marco
knew that to The Rat it was more. Though The Rat knew none of
the things he knew, he saw that the whole story seemed to him a
real
thing. The struggles of Samavia, as he had heard and read of
them in the newspapers, had taken possession of him. His passion
for soldiering and warfare and his curiously mature brain had led
him into following every detail he could lay hold of. He had
listened to all he had heard with remarkable results. He
remembered things older people forgot after they had mentioned
them. He forgot nothing. He had drawn on the flagstones a map
of Samavia which Marco saw was actually correct, and he had made
a rough sketch of Melzarr and the battle which had had such
disastrous results.
``The Maranovitch had possession of Melzarr,'' he explained with
feverish eagerness. ``And the Iarovitch attacked them from
here,'' pointing with his finger. ``That was a mistake. I
should have attacked them from a place where they would not have
been expecting it. They expected attack on their fortifications,
and they were ready to defend them. I believe the enemy could
have stolen up in the night and rushed in here,'' pointing again.
Marco thought he was right. The Rat had argued it all out, and
had studied Melzarr as he might have studied a puzzle or an
arithmetical problem. He was very clever, and as sharp as his
queer face looked.
``I believe you would make a good general if you were grown up,''
said Marco. ``I'd like to show your maps to my father and ask
him if he doesn't think your stratagem would have been a good
one.''
``Does he know much about Samavia?'' asked The Rat.
``He has to read the newspapers because he writes things,'' Marco
answered. ``And every one is thinking about the war. No one can
help it.''
The Rat drew a dingy, folded paper out of his pocket and looked
it over with an air of reflection.
``I'll make a clean one,'' he said. ``I'd like a grown-up man to
look at it and see if it's all right. My father was more than
half- drunk when I was drawing this, so I couldn't ask him
questions. He'll kill himself before long. He had a sort of fit
last night.''
``Tell us, Rat, wot you an' Marco'll 'ave ter do. Let's 'ear wot
you've made up,'' suggested Cad. He drew closer, and so did the
rest of the circle, hugging their knees with their arms.
``This is what we shall have to do,'' began The Rat, in the
hollow whisper of a Secret Party. ``THE HOUR HAS COME. To all
the Secret Ones in Samavia, and to the friends of the Secret
Party in every country, the sign must be carried. It must be
carried by some one who could not be suspected. Who would
suspect two boys--and one of them a cripple? The best thing of
all for us is that I am a cripple. Who would suspect a cripple?
When my father is drunk and beats me, he does it because I won't
go out and beg in the streets and bring him the money I get. He
says that people will nearly always give money to a cripple. I
won't be a beggar for him--the swine-- but I will be one for
Samavia and the Lost Prince. Marco shall pretend to be my
brother and take care of me. I say,'' speaking to Marco with a
sudden change of voice, ``can you sing anything? It doesn't
matter how you do it.''
``Yes, I can sing,'' Marco replied.
``Then Marco will pretend he is singing to make people give him
money. I'll get a pair of crutches somewhere, and part of the
time I will go on crutches and part of the time on my platform.
We'll live like beggars and go wherever we want to. I can whiz
past a man and give the sign and no one will know. Some times
Marco can give it when people are dropping money into his cap.
We can pass from one country to another and rouse everybody who
is of the Secret Party. We'll work our way into Samavia, and
we'll be only two boys--and one a cripple--and nobody will think
we could be doing anything. We'll beg in great cities and on the
highroad.''
``Where'll you get the money to travel?'' said Cad.
``The Secret Party will give it to us, and we sha'n't need much.
We could beg enough, for that matter. We'll sleep under the
stars, or under bridges, or archways, or in dark corners of
streets. I've done it myself many a time when my father drove me
out of doors. If it's cold weather, it's bad enough but if it's
fine weather, it's better than sleeping in the kind of place I'm
used to. Comrade,'' to Marco, ``are you ready?''
He said ``Comrade'' as Loristan did, and somehow Marco did not
resent it, because he was ready to labor for Samavia. It was
only a game, but it made them comrades--and was it really only a
game, after all? His excited voice and his strange, lined face
made it singularly unlike one.
``Yes, Comrade, I am ready,'' Marco answered him.
``We shall be in Samavia when the fighting for the Lost Prince
begins.'' The Rat carried on his story with fire. ``We may see
a battle. We might do something to help. We might carry
messages under a rain of bullets--a rain of bullets!'' The
thought so elated him that he forgot his whisper and his voice
rang out fiercely. ``Boys have been in battles before. We might
find the Lost King--no, the Found King--and ask him to let us be
his servants. He could send us where he couldn't send bigger
people. I could say to him, `Your Majesty, I am called ``The
Rat,'' because I can creep through holes and into corners and
dart about. Order me into any danger and I will obey you. Let
me die like a soldier if I can't live like one.' ''
Suddenly he threw his ragged coat sleeve up across his eyes. He
had wrought himself up tremendously with the picture of the rain
of bullets. And he felt as if he saw the King who had at last
been found. The next moment he uncovered his face.
``That's what we've got to do,'' he said. ``Just that, if you
want to know. And a lot more. There's no end to it!''
Marco's thoughts were in a whirl. It ought not to be nothing but
a game. He grew quite hot all over. If the Secret Party wanted
to send messengers no one would think of suspecting, who could be
more harmless-looking than two vagabond boys wandering about
picking up their living as best they could, not seeming to belong
to any one? And one a cripple. It was true--yes, it was true,
as The Rat said, that his being a cripple made him look safer
than any one else. Marco actually put his forehead in his hands
and pressed his temples.
``What's the matter?'' exclaimed The Rat. ``What are you
thinking about?''
``I'm thinking what a general you would make. I'm thinking that
it might all be real--every word of it. It mightn't be a game at
all,'' said Marco.
``No, it mightn't,'' The Rat answered. ``If I knew where the
Secret Party was, I'd like to go and tell them about it. What's
that!'' he said, suddenly turning his head toward the street.
``What are they calling out?''
Some newsboy with a particularly shrill voice was shouting out
something at the topmost of his lungs.
Tense and excited, no member of the circle stirred or spoke for a
few seconds. The Rat listened, Marco listened, the whole Squad
listened, pricking up their ears.
``Startling news from Samavia,'' the newsboy was shrilling out.
``Amazing story! Descendant of the Lost Prince found!
Descendant of the Lost Prince found!''
``Any chap got a penny?'' snapped The Rat, beginning to shuffle
toward the arched passage.
``I have!'' answered Marco, following him.
``Come on!'' The Rat yelled. ``Let's go and get a paper!'' And
he whizzed down the passage with his swiftest rat-like dart,
while the Squad followed him, shouting and tumbling over each
other.
IX
``IT IS NOT A GAME''
Loristan walked slowly up and down the back sitting-room and
listened to Marco, who sat by the small fire and talked.
``Go on,'' he said, whenever the boy stopped. ``I want to hear
it all. He's a strange lad, and it's a splendid game.''
Marco was telling him the story of his second and third visits to
the inclosure behind the deserted church-yard. He had begun at
the beginning, and his father had listened with a deep interest.
A year later, Marco recalled this evening as a thrilling memory,
and as one which would never pass away from him throughout his
life. He would always be able to call it all back. The small
and dingy back room, the dimness of the one poor gas-burner,
which was all they could afford to light, the iron box pushed
into the corner with its maps and plans locked safely in it, the
erect bearing and actual beauty of the tall form, which the
shabbiness of worn and mended clothes could not hide or dim. Not
even rags and tatters could have made Loristan seem insignificant
or undistinguished. He was always the same. His eyes seemed
darker and more wonderful than ever in their remote
thoughtfulness and interest as he spoke.
``Go on,'' he said. ``It is a splendid game. And it is curious.
He has thought it out well. The lad is a born soldier.''
``It is not a game to him,'' Marco said. ``And it is not a game
to me. The Squad is only playing, but with him it's quite
different. He knows he'll never really get what he wants, but he
feels as if this was something near it. He said I might show you
the map he made. Father, look at it.''
He gave Loristan the clean copy of The Rat's map of Samavia. The
city of Melzarr was marked with certain signs. They were to show
at what points The Rat--if he had been a Samavian general --would
have attacked the capital. As Marco pointed them out, he
explained The Rat's reasons for his planning.
Loristan held the paper for some minutes. He fixed his eyes on
it curiously, and his black brows drew themselves together.
``This is very wonderful!'' he said at last. ``He is quite
right. They might have got in there, and for the very reasons he
hit on.
How did he learn all this?''
``He thinks of nothing else now,'' answered Marco. ``He has
always thought of wars and made plans for battles. He's not like
the rest of the Squad. His father is nearly always drunk, but he
is very well educated, and, when he is only half drunk, he likes
to talk.
The Rat asks him questions then, and leads him on until he finds
out a great deal. Then he begs old newspapers, and he hides
himself in corners and listens to what people are saying. He
says he lies awake at night thinking it out, and he thinks about
it all the day. That was why he got up the Squad.''
Loristan had continued examining the paper.
``Tell him,'' he said, when he refolded and handed it back,
``that I studied his map, and he may be proud of it. You may
also tell him--'' and he smiled quietly as he spoke--``that in my
opinion he is right. The Iarovitch would have held Melzarr
to-day if he had led them.''
Marco was full of exultation.
``I thought you would say he was right. I felt sure you would.
That is what makes me want to tell you the rest,'' he hurried on.
``If you think he is right about the rest too--'' He stopped
awkwardly because of a sudden wild thought which rushed upon him.
``I don't know what you will think,'' he stammered. ``Perhaps it
will seem to you as if the game--as if that part of it
could--could only be a game.''
He was so fervent in spite of his hesitation that Loristan began
to watch him with sympathetic respect, as he always did when the
boy was trying to express something he was not sure of. One of
the great bonds between them was that Loristan was always
interested in his boyish mental processes--in the way in which
his thoughts led him to any conclusion.
``Go on,'' he said again. ``I am like The Rat and I am like you.
It has not seemed quite like a game to me, so far.''
He sat down at the writing-table and Marco, in his eagerness,
drew nearer and leaned against it, resting on his arms and
lowering his voice, though it was always their habit to speak at
such a pitch that no one outside the room they were in could
distinguish what they said.
``It is The Rat's plan for giving the signal for a Rising,'' he
said.
Loristan made a slight movement.
``Does he think there will be a Rising?'' he asked.
``He says that must be what the Secret Party has been preparing
for all these years. And it must come soon. The other nations
see that the fighting must be put an end to even if they have to
stop it themselves. And if the real King is found--but when The
Rat bought the newspaper there was nothing in it about where he
was.
It was only a sort of rumor. Nobody seemed to know anything.''
He stopped a few seconds, but he did not utter the words which
were in his mind. He did not say: ``But YOU know.''
``And The Rat has a plan for giving the signal?'' Loristan said.
Marco forgot his first feeling of hesitation. He began to see
the plan again as he had seen it when The Rat talked. He began
to speak as The Rat had spoken, forgetting that it was a game.
He made even a clearer picture than The Rat had made of the two
vagabond boys--one of them a cripple--making their way from one
place to another, quite free to carry messages or warnings where
they chose, because they were so insignificant and poor-looking
that no one could think of them as anything but waifs and strays,
belonging to nobody and blown about by the wind of poverty and
chance. He felt as if he wanted to convince his father that the
plan was a possible one. He did not quite know why he felt so
anxious to win his approval of the scheme--as if it were real--as
if it could actually be done. But this feeling was what inspired
him to enter into new details and suggest possibilities.
``A boy who was a cripple and one who was only a street singer
and a sort of beggar could get almost anywhere,'' he said.
``Soldiers would listen to a singer if he sang good songs--and
they might not be afraid to talk before him. A strolling singer
and a cripple would perhaps hear a great many things it might be
useful for the Secret Party to know. They might even hear
important things. Don't you think so?''
Before he had gone far with his story, the faraway look had
fallen upon Loristan's face--the look Marco had known so well all
his life. He sat turned a little sidewise from the boy, his
elbow resting on the table and his forehead on his hand. He
looked down at the worn carpet at his feet, and so he looked as
he listened to the end. It was as if some new thought were
slowly growing in his mind as Marco went on talking and enlarging
on The Rat's plan. He did not even look up or change his
position as he answered, ``Yes. I think so.''
But, because of the deep and growing thought in his face, Marco's
courage increased. His first fear that this part of the planning
might seem so bold and reckless that it would only appear to
belong to a boyish game, gradually faded away for some strange
reason. His father had said that the first part of The Rat's
imaginings had not seemed quite like a game to him, and now--even
now--he was not listening as if he were listening to the details
of mere exaggerated fancies. It was as if the thing he was
hearing was not wildly impossible. Marco's knowledge of
Continental countries and of methods of journeying helped him to
enter into much detail and give realism to his plans.
``Sometimes we could pretend we knew nothing but English,'' he
said. ``Then, though The Rat could not understand, I could. I
should always understand in each country. I know the cities and
the places we should want to go to. I know how boys like us
live, and so we should not do anything which would make the
police angry or make people notice us. If any one asked
questions, I would let them believe that I had met The Rat by
chance, and we had made up our minds to travel together because
people gave more money to a boy who sang if he was with a
cripple. There was a boy who used to play the guitar in the
streets of Rome, and he always had a lame girl with him, and
every one knew it was for that reason. When he played, people
looked at the girl and were sorry for her and gave her soldi.
You remember.''
``Yes, I remember. And what you say is true,'' Loristan
answered.
Marco leaned forward across the table so that he came closer to
him. The tone in which the words were said made his courage leap
like a flame. To be allowed to go on with this boldness was to
feel that he was being treated almost as if he were a man. If
his father had wished to stop him, he could have done it with one
quiet glance, without uttering a word. For some wonderful reason
he did not wish him to cease talking. He was willing to hear
what he had to say--he was even interested.
``You are growing older,'' he had said the night he had revealed
the marvelous secret. ``Silence is still the order, but you are
man enough to be told more.''
Was he man enough to be thought worthy to help Samavia in any
small way--even with boyish fancies which might contain a germ of
some thought which older and wiser minds might make useful? Was
he being listened to because the plan, made as part of a game,
was not an impossible one--if two boys who could be trusted could
be found? He caught a deep breath as he went on, drawing still
nearer and speaking so low that his tone was almost a whisper.
``If the men of the Secret Party have been working and thinking
for so many years--they have prepared everything. They know by
this time exactly what must be done by the messengers who are to
give the signal. They can tell them where to go and how to know
the secret friends who must be warned. If the orders could be
written and given to--to some one who has--who has learned to
remember things!'' He had begun to breathe so quickly that he
stopped for a moment.
Loristan looked up. He looked directly into his eyes.
``Some one who has been TRAINED to remember things?'' he said.
``Some one who has been trained,'' Marco went on, catching his
breath again. ``Some one who does not forget--who would never
forget--never! That one, even if he were only twelve--even if he
were only ten--could go and do as he was told.'' Loristan put
his hand on his shoulder.
``Comrade,'' he said, ``you are speaking as if you were ready to
go yourself.''
Marco's eyes looked bravely straight into his, but he said not
one word.
``Do you know what it would mean, Comrade?'' his father went on.
``You are right. It is not a game. And you are not thinking of
it as one. But have you thought how it would be if something
betrayed you--and you were set up against a wall to be SHOT?''
Marco stood up quite straight. He tried to believe he felt the
wall against his back.
``If I were shot, I should be shot for Samavia,'' he said. ``And
for YOU, Father.''
Even as he was speaking, the front door-bell rang and Lazarus
evidently opened it. He spoke to some one, and then they heard
his footsteps approaching the back sitting-room.
``Open the door,'' said Loristan, and Marco opened it.
``There is a boy who is a cripple here, sir,'' the old soldier
said. ``He asked to see Master Marco.''
``If it is The Rat,'' said Loristan, ``bring him in here. I wish
to see him.''
Marco went down the passage to the front door. The Rat was
there, but he was not upon his platform. He was leaning upon an
old pair of crutches, and Marco thought he looked wild and
strange. He was white, and somehow the lines of his face seemed
twisted in a new way. Marco wondered if something had frightened
him, or if he felt ill.
``Rat,'' he began, ``my father--''
``I've come to tell you about MY father,'' The Rat broke in
without waiting to hear the rest, and his voice was as strange as
his pale face. ``I don't know why I've come, but I--I just
wanted to. He's dead!''
``Your father?'' Marco stammered. ``He's--''
``He's dead,'' The Rat answered shakily. ``I told you he'd kill
himself. He had another fit and he died in it. I knew he would,
one of these days. I told him so. He knew he would himself. I
stayed with him till he was dead--and then I got a bursting
headache and I felt sick--and I thought about you.''
Marco made a jump at him because he saw he was suddenly shaking
as if he were going to fall. He was just in time, and Lazarus,
who had been looking on from the back of the passage, came
forward. Together they held him up.
``I'm not going to faint,'' he said weakly, ``but I felt as if I
was. It was a bad fit, and I had to try and hold him. I was all
by myself. The people in the other attic thought he was only
drunk, and they wouldn't come in. He's lying on the floor there,
dead.''
``Come and see my father,'' Marco said. ``He'll tell us what do
do. Lazarus, help him.''
``I can get on by myself,'' said The Rat. ``Do you see my
crutches? I did something for a pawnbroker last night, and he
gave them to me for pay.''
But though he tried to speak carelessly, he had plainly been
horribly shaken and overwrought. His queer face was yellowish
white still, and he was trembling a little.
Marco led the way into the back sitting-room. In the midst of
its shabby gloom and under the dim light Loristan was standing in
one of his still, attentive attitudes. He was waiting for them.
``Father, this is The Rat,'' the boy began. The Rat stopped
short and rested on his crutches, staring at the tall, reposeful
figure with widened eyes.
``Is that your father?'' he said to Marco. And then added, with
a jerky half-laugh, ``He's not much like mine, is he?''
X
THE RAT-- AND SAMAVIA
What The Rat thought when Loristan began to speak to him, Marco
wondered. Suddenly he stood in an unknown world, and it was
Loristan who made it so because its poverty and shabbiness had no
power to touch him. He looked at the boy with calm and clear
eyes, he asked him practical questions gently, and it was plain
that he understood many things without asking questions at all.
Marco thought that perhaps he had, at some time, seen drunken men
die, in his life in strange places. He seemed to know the
terribleness of the night through which The Rat had passed. He
made him sit down, and he ordered Lazarus to bring him some hot
coffee and simple food.
``Haven't had a bite since yesterday,'' The Rat said, still
staring at him. ``How did you know I hadn't?''
``You have not had time,'' Loristan answered.
Afterward he made him lie down on the sofa.
``Look at my clothes,'' said The Rat.
``Lie down and sleep,'' Loristan replied, putting his hand on his
shoulder and gently forcing him toward the sofa. ``You will
sleep a long time. You must tell me how to find the place where
your father died, and I will see that the proper authorities are
notified.''
``What are you doing it for?'' The Rat asked, and then he added,
``sir.''
``Because I am a man and you are a boy. And this is a terrible
thing,'' Loristan answered him.
He went away without saying more, and The Rat lay on the sofa
staring at the wall and thinking about it until he fell asleep.
But, before this happened, Marco had quietly left him alone. So,
as Loristan had told him he would, he slept deeply and long; in
fact, he slept through all the night.
When he awakened it was morning, and Lazarus was standing by the
side of the sofa looking down at him.
``You will want to make yourself clean,'' he said. ``It must be
done.''
``Clean!'' said The Rat, with his squeaky laugh. ``I couldn't
keep clean when I had a room to live in, and now where am I to
wash myself?'' He sat up and looked about him.
``Give me my crutches,'' he said. ``I've got to go. They've let
me sleep here all night. They didn't turn me into the street. I
don't know why they didn't. Marco's father--he's the right sort.
He looks like a swell.''
``The Master,'' said Lazarus, with a rigid manner, ``the Master
is a great gentleman. He would turn no tired creature into the
street. He and his son are poor, but they are of those who give.
He desires to see and talk to you again. You are to have bread
and coffee with him and the young Master. But it is I who tell
you that you cannot sit at table with them until you are clean.
Come with me,'' and he handed him his crutches. His manner was
authoritative, but it was the manner of a soldier; his somewhat
stiff and erect movements were those of a soldier, also, and The
Rat liked them because they made him feel as if he were in
barracks. He did not know what was going to happen, but he got
up and followed him on his crutches.
Lazarus took him to a closet under the stairs where a battered
tin bath was already full of hot water, which the old soldier
himself had brought in pails. There were soap and coarse, clean
towels on a wooden chair, and also there was a much worn but
cleanly suit of clothes.
``Put these on when you have bathed,'' Lazarus ordered, pointing
to them. ``They belong to the young Master and will be large for
you, but they will be better than your own.'' And then he went
out of the closet and shut the door.
It was a new experience for The Rat. So long as he remembered,
he had washed his face and hands--when he had washed them at
all--at an iron tap set in the wall of a back street or court in
some slum. His father and himself had long ago sunk into the
world where to wash one's self is not a part of every-day life.
They had lived amid dirt and foulness, and when his father had
been in a maudlin state, he had sometimes cried and talked of the
long-past days when he had shaved every morning and put on a
clean shirt.
To stand even in the most battered of tin baths full of clean hot
water and to splash and scrub with a big piece of flannel and
plenty of soap was a marvelous thing. The Rat's tired body
responded to the novelty with a curious feeling of freshness and
comfort.
``I dare say swells do this every day,'' he muttered. ``I'd do
it myself if I was a swell. Soldiers have to keep themselves so
clean they shine.''
When, after making the most of his soap and water, he came out of
the closet under the stairs, he was as fresh as Marco himself;
and, though his clothes had been built for a more stalwart body,
his recognition of their cleanliness filled him with pleasure.
He wondered if by any effort he could keep himself clean when he
went out into the world again and had to sleep in any hole the
police did not order him out of.
He wanted to see Marco again, but he wanted more to see the tall
man with the soft dark eyes and that queer look of being a swell
in spite of his shabby clothes and the dingy place he lived in.
There was something about him which made you keep on looking at
him, and wanting to know what he was thinking of, and why you
felt as if you'd take orders from him as you'd take orders from
your general, if you were a soldier. He looked, somehow, like a
soldier, but as if he were something more--as if people had taken
orders from him all his life, and always would take orders from
him. And yet he had that quiet voice and those fine, easy
movements, and he was not a soldier at all, but only a poor man
who wrote things for papers which did not pay him well enough to
give him and his son a comfortable living. Through all the time
of his seclusion with the battered bath and the soap and water,
The Rat thought of him, and longed to have another look at him
and hear him speak again. He did not see any reason why he
should have let him sleep on his sofa or why he should give him a
breakfast before he turned him out to face the world. It was
first-rate of him to do it. The Rat felt that when he was turned
out, after he had had the coffee, he should want to hang about
the neighborhood just on the chance of seeing him pass by
sometimes. He did not know what he was going to do. The parish
officials would by this time have taken his dead father, and he
would not see him again. He did not want to see him again. He
had never seemed like a father. They had never cared anything
for each other. He had only been a wretched outcast whose best
hours had been when he had drunk too much to be violent and
brutal. Perhaps, The Rat thought, he would be driven to going
about on his platform on the pavements and begging, as his father
had tried to force him to do. Could he sell newspapers? What
could a crippled lad do unless he begged or sold papers?
Lazarus was waiting for him in the passage. The Rat held back a
little.
``Perhaps they'd rather not eat their breakfast with me,'' he
hesitated. ``I'm not--I'm not the kind they are. I could
swallow the coffee out here and carry the bread away with me.
And you could thank him for me. I'd want him to know I thanked
him.''
Lazarus also had a steady eye. The Rat realized that he was
looking him over as if he were summing him up.
``You may not be the kind they are, but you may be of a kind the
Master sees good in. If he did not see something, he would not
ask you to sit at his table. You are to come with me.''
The Squad had seen good in The Rat, but no one else had.
Policemen had moved him on whenever they set eyes on him, the
wretched women of the slums had regarded him as they regarded his
darting, thieving namesake; loafing or busy men had seen in him a
young nuisance to be kicked or pushed out of the way. The Squad
had not called ``good'' what they saw in him. They would have
yelled with laughter if they had heard any one else call it so.
``Goodness'' was not considered an attraction in their world.
The Rat grinned a little and wondered what was meant, as he
followed Lazarus into the back sitting-room.
It was as dingy and gloomy as it had looked the night before, but
by the daylight The Rat saw how rigidly neat it was, how well
swept and free from any speck of dust, how the poor windows had
been cleaned and polished, and how everything was set in order.
The coarse linen cloth on the table was fresh and spotless, so
was the cheap crockery, the spoons shone with brightness.
Loristan was standing on the hearth and Marco was near him. They
were waiting for their vagabond guest as if he had been a
gentleman.
The Rat hesitated and shuffled at the door for a moment, and then
it suddenly occurred to him to stand as straight as he could and
salute. When he found himself in the presence of Loristan, he
felt as if he ought to do something, but he did not know what.
Loristan's recognition of his gesture and his expression as he
moved forward lifted from The Rat's shoulders a load which he
himself had not known lay there. Somehow he felt as if something
new had happened to him, as if he were not mere ``vermin,'' after
all, as if he need not be on the defensive--even as if he need
not feel so much in the dark, and like a thing there was no place
in the world for. The mere straight and far-seeing look of this
man's eyes seemed to make a place somewhere for what he looked
at. And yet what he said was quite simple.
``This is well,'' he said. ``You have rested. We will have some
food, and then we will talk together.'' He made a slight gesture
in the direction of the chair at the right hand of his own place.
The Rat hesitated again. What a swell he was! With that wave of
the hand he made you feel as if you were a fellow like himself,
and he was doing you some honor.
``I'm not--'' The Rat broke off and jerked his head toward
Marco. ``He knows--'' he ended, ``I've never sat at a table like
this before.''
``There is not much on it.'' Loristan made the slight gesture
toward the right-hand seat again and smiled. ``Let us sit
down.''
The Rat obeyed him and the meal began. There were only bread and
coffee and a little butter before them. But Lazarus presented
the cups and plates on a small japanned tray as if it were a
golden salver. When he was not serving, he stood upright behind
his master's chair, as though he wore royal livery of scarlet and
gold. To the boy who had gnawed a bone or munched a crust
wheresoever he found them, and with no thought but of the
appeasing of his own wolfish hunger, to watch the two with whom
he sat eat their simple food was a new thing. He knew nothing of
the every-day decencies of civilized people. The Rat liked to
look at them, and he found himself trying to hold his cup as
Loristan did, and to sit and move as Marco was sitting and
moving--taking his bread or butter, when it was held at his side
by Lazarus, as if it were a simple thing to be waited upon.
Marco had had things handed to him all his life, and it did not
make him feel awkward. The Rat knew that his own father had once
lived like this. He himself would have been at ease if chance
had treated him fairly. It made him scowl to think of it. But
in a few minutes Loristan began to talk about the copy of the map
of Samavia. Then The Rat forgot everything else and was ill at
ease no more. He did not know that Loristan was leading him on
to explain his theories about the country and the people and the
war. He found himself telling all that he had read, or
overheard, or THOUGHT as he lay awake in his garret. He had
thought out a great many things in a way not at all like a boy's.
His strangely concentrated and over-mature mind had been full of
military schemes which Loristan listened to with curiosity and
also with amazement. He had become extraordinarily clever in one
direction because he had fixed all his mental powers on one
thing. It seemed scarcely natural that an untaught vagabond lad
should know so much and reason so clearly. It was at least
extraordinarily interesting. There had been no skirmish, no
attack, no battle which he had not led and fought in his own
imagination, and he had made scores of rough queer plans of all
that had been or should have been done. Lazarus listened as
attentively as his master, and once Marco saw him exchange a
startled, rapid glance with Loristan. It was at a moment when
The Rat was sketching with his finger on the cloth an attack
which OUGHT to have been made but was not. And Marco knew at
once that the quickly exchanged look meant ``He is right! If it
had been done, there would have been victory instead of
disaster!''
It was a wonderful meal, though it was only of bread and coffee.
The Rat knew he should never be able to forget it.
Afterward, Loristan told him of what he had done the night
before. He had seen the parish authorities and all had been done
which a city government provides in the case of a pauper's death.
His father would be buried in the usual manner. ``We will follow
him,'' Loristan said in the end. ``You and I and Marco and
Lazarus.''
The Rat's mouth fell open.
``You--and Marco--and Lazarus!'' he exclaimed, staring. ``And
me! Why should any of us go? I don't want to. He wouldn't have
followed me if I'd been the one.''
Loristan remained silent for a few moments.
``When a life has counted for nothing, the end of it is a lonely
thing,'' he said at last. ``If it has forgotten all respect for
itself, pity is all that one has left to give. One would like to
give SOMETHING to anything so lonely.'' He said the last brief
sentence after a pause.
``Let us go,'' Marco said suddenly; and he caught The Rat's hand.
The Rat's own movement was sudden. He slipped from his crutches
to a chair, and sat and gazed at the worn carpet as if he were
not looking at it at all, but at something a long way off. After
a while he looked up at Loristan.
``Do you know what I thought of, all at once?'' he said in a
shaky voice. ``I thought of that `Lost Prince' one. He only
lived once. Perhaps he didn't live a long time. Nobody knows.
But it's five hundred years ago, and, just because he was the
kind he was, every one that remembers him thinks of something
fine. It's queer, but it does you good just to hear his name.
And if he has been training kings for Samavia all these
centuries--they may have been poor and nobody may have known
about them, but they've been KINGS. That's what HE did--just by
being alive a few years. When I think of him and then think
of--the other--there's such an awful difference that --yes--I'm
sorry. For the first time. I'm his son and I can't care about
him; but he's too lonely--I want to go.''
So it was that when the forlorn derelict was carried to the
graveyard where nameless burdens on the city were given to the
earth, a curious funeral procession followed him. There were two
tall and soldierly looking men and two boys, one of whom walked
on crutches, and behind them were ten other boys who walked two
by two. These ten were a queer, ragged lot; but they had
respectfully sober faces, held their heads and their shoulders
well, and walked with a remarkably regular marching step.
It was the Squad; but they had left their ``rifles'' at home.
XI
``COME WITH ME''
When they came back from the graveyard, The Rat was silent all
the way. He was thinking of what had happened and of what lay
before him. He was, in fact, thinking chiefly that nothing lay
before him--nothing. The certainty of that gave his sharp, lined
face new lines and sharpness which made it look pinched and hard.
He had nothing before but a corner in a bare garret in which he
could find little more than a leaking roof over his head--when he
was not turned out into the street. But, if policemen asked him
where he lived, he could say he lived in Bone Court with his
father. Now he couldn't say it.
He got along very well on his crutches, but he was rather tired
when they reached the turn in the street which led in the
direction of his old haunts. At any rate, they were haunts he
knew, and he belonged to them more than he belonged elsewhere.
The Squad stopped at this particular corner because it led to
such homes as they possessed. They stopped in a body and looked
at The Rat, and The Rat stopped also. He swung himself to
Loristan's side, touching his hand to his forehead.
``Thank you, sir,'' he said. ``Line and salute, you chaps!'' And
the Squad stood in line and raised their hands also. ``Thank
you, sir. Thank you, Marco. Good-by.''
``Where are you going?'' Loristan asked.
``I don't know yet,'' The Rat answered, biting his lips.
He and Loristan looked at each other a few moments in silence.
Both of them were thinking very hard. In The Rat's eyes there
was a kind of desperate adoration. He did not know what he
should do when this man turned and walked away from him. It
would be as if the sun itself had dropped out of the heavens--and
The Rat had not thought of what the sun meant before.
But Loristan did not turn and walk away. He looked deep into the
lad's eyes as if he were searching to find some certainty. Then
he said in a low voice, ``You know how poor I am.''
``I--I don't care!'' said The Rat. ``You--you're like a king to
me. I'd stand up and be shot to bits if you told me to do it.''
``I am so poor that I am not sure I can give you enough dry bread
to eat--always. Marco and Lazarus and I are often hungry.
Sometimes you might have nothing to sleep on but the floor. But
I can find a PLACE for you if I take you with me,'' said
Loristan. ``Do you know what I mean by a PLACE?''
``Yes, I do,'' answered The Rat. ``It's what I've never had
before --sir.''
What he knew was that it meant some bit of space, out of all the
world, where he would have a sort of right to stand, howsoever
poor and bare it might be.
``I'm not used to beds or to food enough,'' he said. But he did
not dare to insist too much on that ``place.'' It seemed too
great a thing to be true.
Loristan took his arm.
``Come with me,'' he said. ``We won't part. I believe you are
to be trusted.''
The Rat turned quite white in a sort of anguish of joy. He had
never cared for any one in his life. He had been a sort of young
Cain, his hand against every man and every man's hand against
him. And during the last twelve hours he had plunged into a
tumultuous ocean of boyish hero-worship. This man seemed like a
sort of god to him. What he had said and done the day before, in
what had been really The Rat's hours of extremity, after that
appalling night--the way he had looked into his face and
understood it all, the talk at the table when he had listened to
him seriously, comprehending and actually respecting his plans
and rough maps; his silent companionship as they followed the
pauper hearse together--these things were enough to make the lad
longingly ready to be any sort of servant or slave to him if he
might see and be spoken to by him even once or twice a day.
The Squad wore a look of dismay for a moment, and Loristan saw
it.
``I am going to take your captain with me,'' he said. ``But he
will come back to Barracks. So will Marco.''
``Will yer go on with the game?'' asked Cad, as eager spokesman.
``We want to go on being the `Secret Party.' ''
``Yes, I'll go on,'' The Rat answered. ``I won't give it up.
There's a lot in the papers to-day.''
So they were pacified and went on their way, and Loristan and
Lazarus and Marco and The Rat went on theirs also.
``Queer thing is,'' The Rat thought as they walked together,
``I'm a bit afraid to speak to him unless he speaks to me first.
Never felt that way before with any one.''
He had jeered at policemen and had impudently chaffed ``swells,''
but he felt a sort of secret awe of this man, and actually liked
the feeling.
``It's as if I was a private and he was commander-in-chief,'' he
thought. ``That's it.''
Loristan talked to him as they went. He was simple enough in
his statements of the situation. There was an old sofa in
Marco's bedroom. It was narrow and hard, as Marco's bed itself
was, but The Rat could sleep upon it. They would share what food
they had. There were newspapers and magazines to be read. There
were papers and pencils to draw new maps and plans of battles.
There was even an old map of Samavia of Marco's which the two
boys could study together as an aid to their game. The Rat's
eyes began to have points of fire in them.
``If I could see the papers every morning, I could fight the
battles on paper by night,'' he said, quite panting at the
incredible vision of splendor. Were all the kingdoms of the
earth going to be given to him? Was he going to sleep without a
drunken father near him?
Was he going to have a chance to wash himself and to sit at a
table and hear people say ``Thank you,'' and ``I beg pardon,'' as
if they were using the most ordinary fashion of speech? His own
father, before he had sunk into the depths, had lived and spoken
in this way.
``When I have time, we will see who can draw up the best plans,''
Loristan said.
``Do you mean that you'll look at mine then--when you have
time?'' asked The Rat, hesitatingly. ``I wasn't expecting
that.''
``Yes,'' answered Loristan, ``I'll look at them, and we'll talk
them over.''
As they went on, he told him that he and Marco could do many
things together. They could go to museums and galleries, and
Marco could show him what he himself was familiar with.
``My father said you wouldn't let him come back to Barracks when
you found out about it,'' The Rat said, hesitating again and
growing hot because he remembered so many ugly past days.
``But--but I swear I won't do him any harm, sir. I won't!''
``When I said I believed you could be trusted, I meant several
things,'' Loristan answered him. ``That was one of them. You're
a new recruit. You and Marco are both under a commanding
officer.'' He said the words because he knew they would elate
him and stir his blood.
XII
``ONLY TWO BOYS''
The words did elate him, and his blood was stirred by them every
time they returned to his mind. He remembered them through the
days and nights that followed. He sometimes, indeed, awakened
from his deep sleep on the hard and narrow sofa in Marco's room,
and found that he was saying them half aloud to himself. The
hardness of the sofa did not prevent his resting as he had never
rested before in his life. By contrast with the past he had
known, this poor existence was comfort which verged on luxury.
He got into the battered tin bath every morning, he sat at the
clean table, and could look at Loristan and speak to him and hear
his voice. His chief trouble was that he could hardly keep his
eyes off him, and he was a little afraid he might be annoyed.
But he could not bear to lose a look or a movement.
At the end of the second day, he found his way, at some trouble,
to Lazarus's small back room at the top of the house.
``Will you let me come in and talk a bit?'' he said.
When he went in, he was obliged to sit on the top of Lazarus's
wooden box because there was nothing else for him.
``I want to ask you,'' he plunged into his talk at once, ``do you
think he minds me looking at him so much? I can't help it--but
if he hates it--well--I'll try and keep my eyes on the table.''
``The Master is used to being looked at,'' Lazarus made answer.
``But it would be well to ask himself. He likes open speech.''
``I want to find out everything he likes and everything he
doesn't like,'' The Rat said. ``I want--isn't there
anything--anything you'd let me do for him? It wouldn't matter
what it was. And he needn't know you are not doing it. I know
you wouldn't be willing to give up anything particular. But you
wait on him night and day. Couldn't you give up something to
me?''
Lazarus pierced him with keen eyes. He did not answer for
several seconds.
``Now and then,'' he said gruffly at last, ``I'll let you brush
his boots. But not every day--perhaps once a week.''
``When will you let me have my first turn?'' The Rat asked.
Lazarus reflected. His shaggy eyebrows drew themselves down over
his eyes as if this were a question of state.
``Next Saturday,'' he conceded. ``Not before. I'll tell him
when you brush them.''
``You needn't,'' said The Rat. ``It's not that I want him to
know. I want to know myself that I'm doing something for him.
I'll find out things that I can do without interfering with you.
I'll think them out.''
``Anything any one else did for him would be interfering with
me,'' said Lazarus.
It was The Rat's turn to reflect now, and his face twisted itself
into new lines and wrinkles.
``I'll tell you before I do anything,'' he said, after he had
thought it over. ``You served him first.''
``I have served him ever since he was born,'' said Lazarus.
``He's--he's yours,'' said The Rat, still thinking deeply.
``I am his,'' was Lazarus's stern answer. ``I am his--and the
young Master's.''
``That's it,'' The Rat said. Then a squeak of a half-laugh broke
from him. ``I've never been anybody's,'' he added.
His sharp eyes caught a passing look on Lazarus's face. Such a
queer, disturbed, sudden look. Could he be rather sorry for him?
Perhaps the look meant something like that.
``If you stay near him long enough--and it needn't be long--you
will be his too. Everybody is.''
The Rat sat up as straight as he could. ``When it comes to
that,'' he blurted out, ``I'm his now, in my way. I was his two
minutes after he looked at me with his queer, handsome eyes.
They're queer because they get you, and you want to follow him.
I'm going to follow.''
That night Lazarus recounted to his master the story of the
scene. He simply repeated word for word what had been said, and
Loristan listened gravely.
``We have not had time to learn much of him yet,'' he commented.
``But that is a faithful soul, I think.''
A few days later, Marco missed The Rat soon after their breakfast
hour. He had gone out without saying anything to the household.
He did not return for several hours, and when he came back he
looked tired. In the afternoon he fell asleep on his sofa in
Marco's room and slept heavily. No one asked him any questions
as he volunteered no explanation. The next day he went out again
in the same mysterious manner, and the next and the next. For an
entire week he went out and returned with the tired look; but he
did not explain until one morning, as he lay on his sofa before
getting up, he said to Marco:
``I'm practicing walking with my crutches. I don't want to go
about like a rat any more. I mean to be as near like other
people as I can. I walk farther every morning. I began with two
miles. If I practice every day, my crutches will be like legs.''
``Shall I walk with you?'' asked Marco.
``Wouldn't you mind walking with a cripple?''
``Don't call yourself that,'' said Marco. ``We can talk
together, and try to remember everything we see as we go along.''
``I want to learn to remember things. I'd like to train myself
in that way too,'' The Rat answered. ``I'd give anything to know
some of the things your father taught you. I've got a good
memory. I remember a lot of things I don't want to remember.
Will you go this morning?''
That morning they went, and Loristan was told the reason for
their walk. But though he knew one reason, he did not know all
about it. When The Rat was allowed his ``turn'' of the
boot-brushing, he told more to Lazarus.
``What I want to do,'' he said, ``is not only walk as fast as
other people do, but faster. Acrobats train themselves to do
anything. It's training that does it. There might come a time
when he might need some one to go on an errand quickly, and I'm
going to be ready. I'm going to train myself until he needn't
think of me as if I were only a cripple who can't do things and
has to be taken care of. I want him to know that I'm really as
strong as Marco, and where Marco can go I can go.''
``He'' was what he always said, and Lazarus always understood
without explanation.
`` `The Master' is your name for him,'' he had explained at the
beginning. ``And I can't call him just `Mister' Loristan. It
sounds like cheek. If he was called `General' or `Colonel' I
could stand it--though it wouldn't be quite right. Some day I
shall find a name. When I speak to him, I say `Sir.' ''
The walks were taken every day, and each day were longer. Marco
found himself silently watching The Rat with amazement at his
determination and endurance. He knew that he must not speak of
what he could not fail to see as they walked. He must not tell
him that he looked tired and pale and sometimes desperately
fatigued. He had inherited from his father the tact which sees
what people do not wish to be reminded of. He knew that for some
reason of his own The Rat had determined to do this thing at any
cost to himself. Sometimes his face grew white and worn and he
breathed hard, but he never rested more than a few minutes, and
never turned back or shortened a walk they had planned.
``Tell me something about Samavia, something to remember,'' he
would say, when he looked his worst. ``When I begin to try to
remember, I forget--other things.''
So, as they went on their way, they talked, and The Rat committed
things to memory. He was quick at it, and grew quicker every
day. They invented a game of remembering faces they passed.
Both would learn them by heart, and on their return home Marco
would draw them. They went to the museums and galleries and
learned things there, making from memory lists and descriptions
which at night they showed to Loristan, when he was not too busy
to talk to them.
As the days passed, Marco saw that The Rat was gaining strength.
This exhilarated him greatly. They often went to Hampstead Heath
and walked in the wind and sun. There The Rat would go through
curious exercises which he believed would develop his muscles.
He began to look less tired during and after his journey. There
were even fewer wrinkles on his face, and his sharp eyes looked
less fierce. The talks between the two boys were long and
curious. Marco soon realized that The Rat wanted to
learn--learn--learn.
``Your father can talk to you almost as if you were twenty years
old,'' he said once. ``He knows you can understand what he's
saying. If he were to talk to me, he'd always have to remember
that I was only a rat that had lived in gutters and seen nothing
else.''
They were talking in their room, as they nearly always did after
they went to bed and the street lamp shone in and lighted their
bare little room. They often sat up clasping their knees, Marco
on his poor bed, The Rat on his hard sofa, but neither of them
conscious either of the poorness or hardness, because to each one
the long unknown sense of companionship was such a satisfying
thing. Neither of them had ever talked intimately to another
boy, and now they were together day and night. They revealed
their thoughts to each other; they told each other things it had
never before occurred to either to think of telling any one. In
fact, they found out about themselves, as they talked, things
they had not quite known before. Marco had gradually discovered
that the admiration The Rat had for his father was an impassioned
and curious feeling which possessed him entirely. It seemed to
Marco that it was beginning to be like a sort of religion. He
evidently thought of him every moment. So when he spoke of
Loristan's knowing him to be only a rat of the gutter, Marco felt
he himself was fortunate in remembering something he could say.
``My father said yesterday that you had a big brain and a strong
will,'' he answered from his bed. ``He said that you had a
wonderful memory which only needed exercising. He said it after
he looked over the list you made of the things you had seen in
the Tower.''
The Rat shuffled on his sofa and clasped his knees tighter.
``Did he? Did he?'' he said.
He rested his chin upon his knees for a few minutes and stared
straight before him. Then he turned to the bed.
``Marco,'' he said, in a rather hoarse voice, a queer voice;
``are you jealous?''
``Jealous,'' said Marco; ``why?''
``I mean, have you ever been jealous? Do you know what it is
like?''
``I don't think I do,'' answered Marco, staring a little.
``Are you ever jealous of Lazarus because he's always with your
father--because he's with him oftener than you are--and knows
about his work--and can do things for him you can't? I mean, are
you jealous of--your father?''
Marco loosed his arms from his knees and lay down flat on his
pillow.
``No, I'm not. The more people love and serve him, the better,''
he said. ``The only thing I care for is--is him. I just care
for HIM. Lazarus does too. Don't you?''
The Rat was greatly excited internally. He had been thinking of
this thing a great deal. The thought had sometimes terrified
him. He might as well have it out now if he could. If he could
get at the truth, everything would be easier. But would Marco
really tell him?
``Don't you mind?'' he said, still hoarse and eager--``don't you
mind how much I care for him? Could it ever make you feel
savage? Could it ever set you thinking I was nothing but--what I
am--and that it was cheek of me to push myself in and fasten on
to a gentleman who only took me up for charity? Here's the
living truth,'' he ended in an outburst; ``if I were you and you
were me, that's what I should be thinking. I know it is. I
couldn't help it. I should see every low thing there was in you,
in your manners and your voice and your looks. I should see
nothing but the contrast between you and me and between you and
him. I should be so jealous that I should just rage. I should
HATE you--and I should DESPISE you!''
He had wrought himself up to such a passion of feeling that he
set Marco thinking that what he was hearing meant strange and
strong emotions such as he himself had never experienced. The
Rat had been thinking over all this in secret for some time, it
was evident. Marco lay still a few minutes and thought it over.
Then he found something to say, just as he had found something
before.
``You might, if you were with other people who thought in the
same way,'' he said, ``and if you hadn't found out that it is
such a mistake to think in that way, that it's even stupid. But,
you see, if you were I, you would have lived with my father, and
he'd have told you what he knows--what he's been finding out all
his life.''
``What's he found out?''
``Oh!'' Marco answered, quite casually, ``just that you can't set
savage thoughts loose in the world, any more than you can let
loose savage beasts with hydrophobia. They spread a sort of
rabies, and they always tear and worry you first of all.''
``What do you mean?'' The Rat gasped out.
``It's like this,'' said Marco, lying flat and cool on his hard
pillow and looking at the reflection of the street lamp on the
ceiling. ``That day I turned into your Barracks, without knowing
that you'd think I was spying, it made you feel savage, and you
threw the stone at me. If it had made me feel savage and I'd
rushed in and fought, what would have happened to all of us?''
The Rat's spirit of generalship gave the answer.
``I should have called on the Squad to charge with fixed
bayonets. They'd have half killed you. You're a strong chap,
and you'd have hurt a lot of them.''
A note of terror broke into his voice. ``What a fool I should
have been!'' he cried out. ``I should never have come here! I
should never have known HIM!'' Even by the light of the street
lamp Marco could see him begin to look almost ghastly.
``The Squad could easily have half killed me,'' Marco added.
``They could have quite killed me, if they had wanted to do it.
And who would have got any good out of it? It would only have
been a street- lads' row--with the police and prison at the end
of it.''
``But because you'd lived with him,'' The Rat pondered, ``you
walked in as if you didn't mind, and just asked why we did it,
and looked like a stronger chap than any of us--and
different--different. I wondered what was the matter with you,
you were so cool and steady. I know now. It was because you
were like him. He'd taught you. He's like a wizard.''
``He knows things that wizards think they know, but he knows them
better,'' Marco said. ``He says they're not queer and unnatural.
They're just simple laws of nature. You have to be either on one
side or the other, like an army. You choose your side. You
either build up or tear down. You either keep in the light where
you can see, or you stand in the dark and fight everything that
comes near you, because you can't see and you think it's an
enemy. No, you wouldn't have been jealous if you'd been I and
I'd been you.''
``And you're NOT?'' The Rat's sharp voice was almost hollow.
``You'll swear you're not?''
``I'm not,'' said Marco.
The Rat's excitement even increased a shade as he poured forth
his confession.
``I was afraid,'' he said. ``I've been afraid every day since I
came here. I'll tell you straight out. It seemed just natural
that you and Lazarus wouldn't stand me, just as I wouldn't have
stood you. It seemed just natural that you'd work together to
throw me out. I knew how I should have worked myself. Marco--I
said I'd tell you straight out--I'm jealous of you. I'm jealous
of Lazarus. It makes me wild when I see you both knowing all
about him, and fit and ready to do anything he wants done. I'm
not ready and I'm not fit.''
``You'd do anything he wanted done, whether you were fit and
ready or not,'' said Marco. ``He knows that.''
``Does he? Do you think he does?'' cried The Rat. ``I wish he'd
try me. I wish he would.''
Marco turned over on his bed and rose up on his elbow so that he
faced The Rat on his sofa.
``Let us WAIT,'' he said in a whisper. ``Let us WAIT.''
There was a pause, and then The Rat whispered also.
``For what?''
``For him to find out that we're fit to be tried. Don't you see
what fools we should be if we spent our time in being jealous,
either of us. We're only two boys. Suppose he saw we were only
two silly fools. When you are jealous of me or of Lazarus, just
go and sit down in a still place and think of HIM. Don't think
about yourself or about us. He's so quiet that to think about
him makes you quiet yourself. When things go wrong or when I'm
lonely, he's taught me to sit down and make myself think of
things I like--pictures, books, monuments, splendid places. It
pushes the other things out and sets your mind going properly.
He doesn't know I nearly always think of him. He's the best
thought himself. You try it. You're not really jealous. You
only THINK you are. You'll find that out if you always stop
yourself in time. Any one can be such a fool if he lets himself.
And he can always stop it if he makes up his mind. I'm not
jealous. You must let that thought alone. You're not jealous
yourself. Kick that thought into the street.''
The Rat caught his breath and threw his arms up over his eyes.
``Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord!'' he said; ``if I'd lived near him always
as you have. If I just had.''
``We're both living near him now,'' said Marco. ``And here's
something to think of,'' leaning more forward on his elbow.
``The kings who were being made ready for Samavia have waited all
these years; WE can make ourselves ready and wait so that, if
just two boys are wanted to do something--just two boys--we can
step out of the ranks when the call comes and say `Here!' Now
let's lie down and think of it until we go to sleep.''
XIII
LORISTAN ATTENDS A DRILL OF THE SQUAD, AND MARCO MEETS A
SAMAVIAN
The Squad was not forgotten. It found that Loristan himself
would have regarded neglect as a breach of military duty.
``You must remember your men,'' he said, two or three days after
The Rat became a member of his household. ``You must keep up
their drill. Marco tells me it was very smart. Don't let them
get slack.''
``His men!'' The Rat felt what he could not have put into words.
He knew he had worked, and that the Squad had worked, in their
hidden holes and corners. Only hidden holes and corners had been
possible for them because they had existed in spite of the
protest of their world and the vigilance of its policemen. They
had tried many refuges before they found the Barracks. No one
but resented the existence of a troop of noisy vagabonds. But
somehow this man knew that there had evolved from it something
more than mere noisy play, that he, The Rat, had MEANT order and
discipline.
``His men!'' It made him feel as if he had had the Victoria
Cross fastened on his coat. He had brain enough to see many
things, and he knew that it was in this way that Loristan was
finding him his ``place.'' He knew how.
When they went to the Barracks, the Squad greeted them with a
tumultuous welcome which expressed a great sense of relief.
Privately the members had been filled with fears which they had
talked over together in deep gloom. Marco's father, they
decided, was too big a swell to let the two come back after he
had seen the sort the Squad was made up of. He might be poor
just now, toffs sometimes lost their money for a bit, but you
could see what he was, and fathers like him weren't going to let
their sons make friends with ``such as us.'' He'd stop the drill
and the ``Secret Society'' game. That's what he'd do!
But The Rat came swinging in on his secondhand crutches looking
as if he had been made a general, and Marco came with him; and
the drill the Squad was put through was stricter and finer than
any drill they had ever known.
``I wish my father could have seen that,'' Marco said to The Rat.
The Rat turned red and white and then red again, but he said not
a single word. The mere thought was like a flash of fire passing
through him. But no fellow could hope for a thing as big as
that. The Secret Party, in its subterranean cavern, surrounded
by its piled arms, sat down to read the morning paper.
The war news was bad to read. The Maranovitch held the day for
the moment, and while they suffered and wrought cruelties in the
capital city, the Iarovitch suffered and wrought cruelties in the
country outside. So fierce and dark was the record that Europe
stood aghast.
The Rat folded his paper when he had finished, and sat biting his
nails. Having done this for a few minutes, he began to speak in
his dramatic and hollow Secret Party whisper.
``The hour has come,'' he said to his followers. ``The
messengers must go forth. They know nothing of what they go for;
they only know that they must obey. If they were caught and
tortured, they could betray nothing because they know nothing but
that, at certain places, they must utter a certain word. They
carry no papers. All commands they must learn by heart. When
the sign is given, the Secret Party will know what to do--where
to meet and where to attack.''
He drew plans of the battle on the flagstones, and he sketched an
imaginary route which the two messengers were to follow. But his
knowledge of the map of Europe was not worth much, and he turned
to Marco.
``You know more about geography that I do. You know more about
everything,'' he said. ``I only know Italy is at the bottom and
Russia is at one side and England's at the other. How would the
Secret Messengers go to Samavia? Can you draw the countries
they'd have to pass through?''
Because any school-boy who knew the map could have done the same
thing, Marco drew them. He also knew the stations the Secret Two
would arrive at and leave by when they entered a city, the
streets they would walk through and the very uniforms they would
see; but of these things he said nothing. The reality his
knowledge gave to the game was, however, a thrilling thing. He
wished he could have been free to explain to The Rat the things
he knew. Together they could have worked out so many details of
travel and possible adventure that it would have been almost as
if they had set out on their journey in fact.
As it was, the mere sketching of the route fired The Rat's
imagination. He forged ahead with the story of adventure, and
filled it with such mysterious purport and design that the Squad
at times gasped for breath. In his glowing version the Secret
Two entered cities by midnight and sang and begged at palace
gates where kings driving outward paused to listen and were given
the Sign.
``Though it would not always be kings,'' he said. ``Sometimes it
would be the poorest people. Sometimes they might seem to be
beggars like ourselves, when they were only Secret Ones
disguised. A great lord might wear poor clothes and pretend to
be a workman, and we should only know him by the signs we had
learned by heart. When we were sent to Samavia, we should be
obliged to creep in through some back part of the country where
no fighting was being done and where no one would attack. Their
generals are not clever enough to protect the parts which are
joined to friendly countries, and they have not forces enough.
Two boys could find a way in if they thought it out.''
He became possessed by the idea of thinking it out on the spot.
He drew his rough map of Samavia on the flagstones with his
chalk.
``Look here,'' he said to Marco, who, with the elated and
thrilled Squad, bent over it in a close circle of heads.
``Beltrazo is here and Carnolitz is here--and here is Jiardasia.
Beltrazo and Jiardasia are friendly, though they don't take
sides. All the fighting is going on in the country about
Melzarr. There is no reason why they should prevent single
travelers from coming in across the frontiers of friendly
neighbors. They're not fighting with the countries outside, they
are fighting with themselves.'' He paused a moment and thought.
``The article in that magazine said something about a huge forest
on the eastern frontier. That's here. We could wander into a
forest and stay there until we'd planned all we wanted to do.
Even the people who had seen us would forget about us. What we
have to do is to make people feel as if we were
nothing--nothing.''
They were in the very midst of it, crowded together, leaning
over, stretching necks and breathing quickly with excitement,
when Marco lifted his head. Some mysterious impulse made him do
it in spite of himself.
``There's my father!'' he said.
The chalk dropped, everything dropped, even Samavia. The Rat was
up and on his crutches as if some magic force had swung him
there. How he gave the command, or if he gave it at all, not
even he himself knew. But the Squad stood at salute.
Loristan was standing at the opening of the archway as Marco had
stood that first day. He raised his right hand in return salute
and came forward.
``I was passing the end of the street and remembered the Barracks
was here,'' he explained. ``I thought I should like to look at
your men, Captain.''
He smiled, but it was not a smile which made his words really a
joke. He looked down at the chalk map drawn on the flagstones.
``You know that map well,'' he said. ``Even I can see that it is
Samavia. What is the Secret Party doing?''
``The messengers are trying to find a way in,'' answered Marco.
``We can get in there,'' said The Rat, pointing with a crutch.
``There's a forest where we could hide and find out things.''
``Reconnoiter,'' said Loristan, looking down. ``Yes. Two stray
boys could be very safe in a forest. It's a good game.''
That he should be there! That he should, in his own wonderful
way, have given them such a thing as this. That he should have
cared enough even to look up the Barracks, was what The Rat was
thinking. A batch of ragamuffins they were and nothing else, and
he standing looking at them with his fine smile. There was
something about him which made him seem even splendid. The Rat's
heart thumped with startled joy.
``Father,'' said Marco, ``will you watch The Rat drill us? I
want you to see how well it is done.''
``Captain, will you do me that honor?'' Loristan said to The Rat,
and to even these words he gave the right tone, neither jesting
nor too serious. Because it was so right a tone, The Rat's
pulses beat only with exultation. This god of his had looked at
his maps, he had talked of his plans, he had come to see the
soldiers who were his work! The Rat began his drill as if he had
been reviewing an army.
What Loristan saw done was wonderful in its mechanical exactness.
The Squad moved like the perfect parts of a perfect machine.
That they could so do it in such space, and that they should have
accomplished such precision, was an extraordinary testimonial to
the military efficiency and curious qualities of this one
hunchbacked, vagabond officer.
``That is magnificent!'' the spectator said, when it was over.
``It could not be better done. Allow me to congratulate you.''
He shook The Rat's hand as if it had been a man's, and, after he
had shaken it, he put his own hand lightly on the boy's shoulder
and let it rest there as he talked a few minutes to them all.
He kept his talk within the game, and his clear comprehension of
it added a flavor which even the dullest member of the Squad was
elated by. Sometimes you couldn't understand toffs when they
made a shy at being friendly, but you could understand him, and
he stirred up your spirits. He didn't make jokes with you,
either, as if a chap had to be kept grinning. After the few
minutes were over, he went away. Then they sat down again in
their circle and talked about him, because they could talk and
think about nothing else. They stared at Marco furtively,
feeling as if he were a creature of another world because he had
lived with this man. They stared at The Rat in a new way also.
The wonderful-looking hand had rested on his shoulder, and he had
been told that what he had done was magnificent.
``When you said you wished your father could have seen the
drill,'' said The Rat, ``you took my breath away. I'd never have
had the cheek to think of it myself--and I'd never have dared to
let you ask him, even if you wanted to do it. And he came
himself! It struck me dumb.''
``If he came,'' said Marco, ``it was because he wanted to see
it.''
When they had finished talking, it was time for Marco and The Rat
to go on their way. Loristan had given The Rat an errand. At a
certain hour he was to present himself at a certain shop and
receive a package.
``Let him do it alone,'' Loristan said to Marco. ``He will be
better pleased. His desire is to feel that he is trusted to do
things alone.''
So they parted at a street corner, Marco to walk back to No. 7
Philibert Place, The Rat to execute his commission. Marco turned
into one of the better streets, through which he often passed on
his way home. It was not a fashionable quarter, but it contained
some respectable houses in whose windows here and there were to
be seen neat cards bearing the word ``Apartments,'' which meant
that the owner of the house would let to lodgers his drawing-room
or sitting-room suite.
As Marco walked up the street, he saw some one come out of the
door of one of the houses and walk quickly and lightly down the
pavement. It was a young woman wearing an elegant though quiet
dress, and a hat which looked as if it had been bought in Paris
or Vienna. She had, in fact, a slightly foreign air, and it was
this, indeed, which made Marco look at her long enough to see
that she was also a graceful and lovely person. He wondered what
her nationality was. Even at some yards' distance he could see
that she had long dark eyes and a curved mouth which seemed to be
smiling to itself. He thought she might be Spanish or Italian.
He was trying to decide which of the two countries she belonged
to, as she drew near to him, but quite suddenly the curved mouth
ceased smiling as her foot seemed to catch in a break in the
pavement, and she so lost her balance that she would have fallen
if he had not leaped forward and caught her.
She was light and slender, and he was a strong lad and managed to
steady her. An expression of sharp momentary anguish crossed her
face.
``I hope you are not hurt,'' Marco said.
She bit her lip and clutched his shoulder very hard with her slim
hand.
``I have twisted my ankle,'' she answered. ``I am afraid I have
twisted it badly. Thank you for saving me. I should have had a
bad fall.''
Her long, dark eyes were very sweet and grateful. She tried to
smile, but there was such distress under the effort that Marco
was afraid she must have hurt herself very much.
``Can you stand on your foot at all?'' he asked.
``I can stand a little now,'' she said, ``but I might not be able
to stand in a few minutes. I must get back to the house while I
can bear to touch the ground with it. I am so sorry. I am
afraid I shall have to ask you to go with me. Fortunately it is
only a few yards away.''
``Yes,'' Marco answered. ``I saw you come out of the house. If
you will lean on my shoulder, I can soon help you back. I am
glad to do it. Shall we try now?''
She had a gentle and soft manner which would have appealed to any
boy. Her voice was musical and her enunciation exquisite.
Whether she was Spanish or Italian, it was easy to imagine her a
person who did not always live in London lodgings, even of the
better class.
``If you please,'' she answered him. ``It is very kind of you.
You are very strong, I see. But I am glad to have only a few
steps to go.''
She rested on his shoulder as well as on her umbrella, but it was
plain that every movement gave her intense pain. She caught her
lip with her teeth, and Marco thought she turned white. He could
not help liking her. She was so lovely and gracious and brave.
He could not bear to see the suffering in her face.
``I am so sorry!'' he said, as he helped her, and his boy's voice
had something of the wonderful sympathetic tone of Loristan's.
The beautiful lady herself remarked it, and thought how unlike it
was to the ordinary boy-voice.
``I have a latch-key,'' she said, when they stood on the low
step.
She found the latch-key in her purse and opened the door. Marco
helped her into the entrance-hall. She sat down at once in a
chair near the hat-stand. The place was quite plain and
old-fashioned inside.
``Shall I ring the front-door bell to call some one?'' Marco
inquired.
``I am afraid that the servants are out,'' she answered. ``They
had a holiday. Will you kindly close the door? I shall be
obliged to ask you to help me into the sitting-room at the end of
the hall. I shall find all I want there--if you will kindly hand
me a few things. Some one may come in presently--perhaps one of
the other lodgers --and, even if I am alone for an hour or so, it
will not really matter.''
``Perhaps I can find the landlady,'' Marco suggested. The
beautiful person smiled.
``She has gone to her sister's wedding. That is why I was going
out to spend the day myself. I arranged the plan to accommodate
her. How good you are! I shall be quite comfortable directly,
really. I can get to my easy-chair in the sitting-room now I
have rested a little.''
Marco helped her to her feet, and her sharp, involuntary
exclamation of pain made him wince internally. Perhaps it was a
worse sprain than she knew.
The house was of the early-Victorian London order. A ``front
lobby'' with a dining-room on the right hand, and a ``back
lobby,'' after the foot of the stairs was passed, out of which
opened the basement kitchen staircase and a sitting-room looking
out on a gloomy flagged back yard inclosed by high walls. The
sitting-room was rather gloomy itself, but there were a few
luxurious things among the ordinary furnishings. There was an
easy-chair with a small table near it, and on the table were a
silver lamp and some rather elegant trifles. Marco helped his
charge to the easy-chair and put a cushion from the sofa under
her foot. He did it very gently, and, as he rose after doing it,
he saw that the long, soft dark eyes were looking at him in a
curious way.
``I must go away now,'' he said, ``but I do not like to leave
you. May I go for a doctor?''
``How dear you are!'' she exclaimed. ``But I do not want one,
thank you. I know exactly what to do for a sprained ankle. And
perhaps mine is not really a sprain. I am going to take off my
shoe and see.''
``May I help you?'' Marco asked, and he kneeled down again and
carefully unfastened her shoe and withdrew it from her foot. It
was a slender and delicate foot in a silk stocking, and she bent
and gently touched and rubbed it.
``No,'' she said, when she raised herself, ``I do not think it is
a sprain. Now that the shoe is off and the foot rests on the
cushion, it is much more comfortable, much more. Thank you,
thank you. If you had not been passing I might have had a
dangerous fall.''
``I am very glad to have been able to help you,'' Marco answered,
with an air of relief. ``Now I must go, if you think you will be
all right.''
``Don't go yet,'' she said, holding out her hand. ``I should
like to know you a little better, if I may. I am so grateful. I
should like to talk to you. You have such beautiful manners for
a boy,'' she
ended, with a pretty, kind laugh, ``and I believe I know where
you got them from.''
``You are very kind to me,'' Marco answered, wondering if he did
not redden a little. ``But I must go because my father will--''
``Your father would let you stay and talk to me,'' she said, with
even a prettier kindliness than before. ``It is from him you
have inherited your beautiful manner. He was once a friend of
mine. I hope he is my friend still, though perhaps he has
forgotten me.''
All that Marco had ever learned and all that he had ever trained
himself to remember, quickly rushed back upon him now, because he
had a clear and rapidly working brain, and had not lived the
ordinary boy's life. Here was a beautiful lady of whom he knew
nothing at all but that she had twisted her foot in the street
and he had helped her back into her house. If silence was still
the order, it was not for him to know things or ask questions or
answer them. She might be the loveliest lady in the world and
his father her dearest friend, but, even if this were so, he
could best serve them both by obeying her friend's commands with
all courtesy, and forgetting no instruction he had given.
``I do not think my father ever forgets any one,'' he answered.
``No, I am sure he does not,'' she said softly. ``Has he been to
Samavia during the last three years?''
Marco paused a moment.
``Perhaps I am not the boy you think I am,'' he said. ``My
father has never been to Samavia.''
``He has not? But--you are Marco Loristan?''
``Yes. That is my name.''
Suddenly she leaned forward and her long lovely eyes filled with
fire.
``Then you are a Samavian, and you know of the disasters
overwhelming us. You know all the hideousness and barbarity of
what is being done. Your father's son must know it all!''
``Every one knows it,'' said Marco.
``But it is your country--your own! Your blood must burn in your
veins!''
Marco stood quite still and looked at her. His eyes told whether
his blood burned or not, but he did not speak. His look was
answer enough, since he did not wish to say anything.
``What does your father think? I am a Samavian myself, and I
think night and day. What does he think of the rumor about the
descendant of the Lost Prince? Does he believe it?''
Marco was thinking very rapidly. Her beautiful face was glowing
with emotion, her beautiful voice trembled. That she should be a
Samavian, and love Samavia, and pour her feeling forth even to a
boy, was deeply moving to him. But howsoever one was moved, one
must remember that silence was still the order. When one was
very young, one must remember orders first of all.
``It might be only a newspaper story,'' he said. ``He says one
cannot trust such things. If you know him, you know he is very
calm.''
``Has he taught you to be calm too?'' she said pathetically.
``You are only a boy. Boys are not calm. Neither are women when
their hearts are wrung. Oh, my Samavia! Oh, my poor little
country! My brave, tortured country!'' and with a sudden sob she
covered her face with her hands.
A great lump mounted to Marco's throat. Boys could not cry, but
he knew what she meant when he said her heart was wrung.
When she lifted her head, the tears in her eyes made them softer
than ever.
``If I were a million Samavians instead of one woman, I should
know what to do!'' she cried. ``If your father were a million
Samavians, he would know, too. He would find Ivor's descendant,
if he is on the earth, and he would end all this horror!''
``Who would not end it if they could?'' cried Marco, quite
fiercely.
``But men like your father, men who are Samavians, must think
night and day about it as I do,'' she impetuously insisted.
``You see, I cannot help pouring my thoughts out even to a
boy--because he is a Samavian. Only Samavians care. Samavia
seems so little and unimportant to other people. They don't even
seem to know that the blood she is pouring forth pours from human
veins and beating human hearts. Men like your father must think,
and plan, and feel that they must--must find a way. Even a
woman feels it. Even a boy must. Stefan Loristan cannot be
sitting quietly at home, knowing that Samavian hearts are being
shot through and Samavian blood poured forth. He cannot think
and say NOTHING!''
Marco started in spite of himself. He felt as if his father had
been struck in the face. How dare she say such words! Big as he
was, suddenly he looked bigger, and the beautiful lady saw that
he did.
``He is my father,'' he said slowly.
She was a clever, beautiful person, and saw that she had made a
great mistake.
``You must forgive me,'' she exclaimed. ``I used the wrong words
because I was excited. That is the way with women. You must see
that I meant that I knew he was giving his heart and strength,
his whole being, to Samavia, even though he must stay in
London.''
She started and turned her head to listen to the sound of some
one using the latch-key and opening the front door. The some one
came in with the heavy step of a man.
``It is one of the lodgers,'' she said. ``I think it is the one
who lives in the third floor sitting-room.''
``Then you won't be alone when I go,'' said Marco. ``I am glad
some one has come. I will say good-morning. May I tell my
father your name?''
``Tell me that you are not angry with me for expressing myself so
awkwardly,'' she said.
``You couldn't have meant it. I know that,'' Marco answered
boyishly. ``You couldn't.''
``No, I couldn't,'' she repeated, with the same emphasis on the
words.
She took a card from a silver case on the table and gave it to
him.
``Your father will remember my name,'' she said. ``I hope he
will let me see him and tell him how you took care of me.''
She shook his hand warmly and let him go. But just as he reached
the door she spoke again.
``Oh, may I ask you to do one thing more before you leave me?''
she said suddenly. ``I hope you won't mind. Will you run
up-stairs into the drawing-room and bring me the purple book from
the small table? I shall not mind being alone if I have
something to read.''
``A purple book? On a small table?'' said Marco.
``Between the two long windows,'' she smiled back at him.
The drawing-room of such houses as these is always to be reached
by one short flight of stairs.
Marco ran up lightly.
XIV
MARCO DOES NOT ANSWER
By the time he turned the corner of the stairs, the beautiful
lady had risen from her seat in the back room and walked into the
dining-room at the front. A heavily-built, dark-bearded man was
standing inside the door as if waiting for her.
``I could do nothing with him,'' she said at once, in her soft
voice, speaking quite prettily and gently, as if what she said
was the most natural thing in the world. ``I managed the little
trick of the sprained foot really well, and got him into the
house. He is an amiable boy with perfect manners, and I thought
it might be easy to surprise him into saying more than he knew he
was saying. You can generally do that with children and young
things. But he either knows nothing or has been trained to hold
his tongue. He's not stupid, and he's of a high spirit. I made
a pathetic little scene about Samavia, because I saw he could be
worked up. It did work him up. I tried him with the Lost Prince
rumor; but, if there is truth in it, he does not or will not
know. I tried to make him lose his temper and betray something
in defending his father, whom he thinks a god, by the way. But I
made a mistake. I saw that. It's a pity. Boys can sometimes be
made to tell anything.'' She spoke very quickly under her
breath. The man spoke quickly too.
``Where is he?'' he asked.
``I sent him up to the drawing-room to look for a book. He will
look for a few minutes. Listen. He's an innocent boy. He sees
me only as a gentle angel. Nothing will SHAKE him so much as to
hear me tell him the truth suddenly. It will be such a shock to
him that perhaps you can do something with him then. He may lose
his hold on himself. He's only a boy.''
``You're right,'' said the bearded man. ``And when he finds out
he is not free to go, it may alarm him and we may get something
worth while.''
``If we could find out what is true, or what Loristan thinks is
true, we should have a clue to work from,'' she said.
``We have not much time,'' the man whispered. ``We are ordered
to Bosnia at once. Before midnight we must be on the way.''
``Let us go into the other room. He is coming.''
When Marco entered the room, the heavily-built man with the
pointed dark beard was standing by the easy-chair.
``I am sorry I could not find the book,'' he apologized. ``I
looked on all the tables.''
``I shall be obliged to go and search for it myself,'' said the
Lovely Person.
She rose from her chair and stood up smiling. And at her first
movement Marco saw that she was not disabled in the least.
``Your foot!'' he exclaimed. ``It's better?''
``It wasn't hurt,'' she answered, in her softly pretty voice and
with her softly pretty smile. ``I only made you think so.''
It was part of her plan to spare him nothing of shock in her
sudden transformation. Marco felt his breath leave him for a
moment.
``I made you believe I was hurt because I wanted you to come into
the house with me,'' she added. ``I wished to find out certain
things I am sure you know.''
``They were things about Samavia,'' said the man. ``Your father
knows them, and you must know something of them at least. It is
necessary that we should hear what you can tell us. We shall not
allow you to leave the house until you have answered certain
questions I shall ask you.''
Then Marco began to understand. He had heard his father speak of
political spies, men and women who were paid to trace the people
that certain governments or political parties desired to have
followed and observed. He knew it was their work to search out
secrets, to disguise themselves and live among innocent people as
if they were merely ordinary neighbors.
They must be spies who were paid to follow his father because he
was a Samavian and a patriot. He did not know that they had
taken the house two months before, and had accomplished several
things during their apparently innocent stay in it. They had
discovered Loristan and had learned to know his outgoings and
incomings, and also the outgoings and incomings of Lazarus,
Marco, and The Rat. But they meant, if possible, to learn other
things. If the boy could be startled and terrified into
unconscious revelations, it might prove well worth their while to
have played this bit of melodrama before they locked the front
door behind them and hastily crossed the Channel, leaving their
landlord to discover for himself that the house had been vacated.
In Marco's mind strange things were happening. They were spies!
But that was not all. The Lovely Person had been right when she
said that he would receive a shock. His strong young chest
swelled. In all his life, he had never come face to face with
black treachery before. He could not grasp it. This gentle and
friendly being with the grateful soft voice and grateful soft
eyes had betrayed--BETRAYED him! It seemed impossible to believe
it, and yet the smile on herm curved mouth told him that it was
true. When he had sprung to help her, she had been playing a
trick! When he had been sorry for her pain and had winced at the
sound of her low exclamation, she had been deliberately laying a
trap to harm him. For a few seconds he was stunned--perhaps, if
he had not been his father's son, he might have been stunned
only. But he was more. When the first seconds had passed, there
arose slowly within him a sense of something like high, remote
disdain. It grew in his deep boy's eyes as he gazed directly
into the pupils of the long soft dark ones. His body felt as if
it were growing taller.
``You are very clever,'' he said slowly. Then, after a second's
pause, he added, ``I was too young to know that there was any one
so--clever--in the world.''
The Lovely Person laughed, but she did not laugh easily. She
spoke to her companion.
``A grand seigneur!'' she said. ``As one looks at him, one half
believes it is true.''
The man with the beard was looking very angry. His eyes were
savage and his dark skin reddened. Marco thought that he looked
at him as if he hated him, and was made fierce by the mere sight
of him, for some mysterious reason.
``Two days before you left Moscow,'' he said, ``three men came to
see your father. They looked like peasants. They talked to him
for more than an hour. They brought with them a roll of
parchment. Is that not true?''
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``Before you went to Moscow, you were in Budapest. You went
there from Vienna. You were there for three months, and your
father saw many people. Some of them came in the middle of the
night.''
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``You have spent your life in traveling from one country to
another,'' persisted the man. ``You know the European languages
as if you were a courier, or the portier in a Viennese hotel. Do
you not?''
Marco did not answer.
The Lovely Person began to speak to the man rapidly in Russian.
``A spy and an adventurer Stefan Loristan has always been and
always will be,'' she said. ``We know what he is. The police in
every capital in Europe know him as a sharper and a vagabond, as
well as a spy. And yet, with all his cleverness, he does not
seem to have money. What did he do with the bribe the
Maranovitch gave him for betraying what he knew of the old
fortress? The boy doesn't even suspect him. Perhaps it's true
that he knows nothing. Or perhaps it is true that he has been so
ill-treated and flogged from his babyhood that he dare not speak.
There is a cowed look in his eyes in spite of his childish
swagger. He's been both starved and beaten.''
The outburst was well done. She did not look at Marco as she
poured forth her words. She spoke with the abruptness and
impetuosity of a person whose feelings had got the better of her.
If Marco was sensitive about his father, she felt sure that his
youth would make his face reveal something if his tongue did
not--if he understood Russian, which was one of the things it
would be useful to find out, because it was a fact which would
verify many other things.
Marco's face disappointed her. No change took place in it, and
the blood did not rise to the surface of his skin. He listened
with an uninterested air, blank and cold and polite. Let them
say what they chose.
The man twisted his pointed beard and shrugged his shoulders.
``We have a good little wine-cellar downstairs,'' he said. ``You
are going down into it, and you will probably stay there for some
time if you do not make up your mind to answer my questions. You
think that nothing can happen to you in a house in a London
street where policemen walk up and down. But you are mistaken.
If you yelled now, even if any one chanced to hear you, they
would only think you were a lad getting a thrashing he deserved.
You can yell as much as you like in the black little wine-cellar,
and no one will hear at all. We only took this house for three
months, and we shall leave it to-night without mentioning the
fact to any
one. If we choose to leave you in the wine-cellar, you will wait
there until somebody begins to notice that no one goes in and
out, and chances to mention it to the landlord--which few people
would take the trouble to do. Did you come here from Moscow?''
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``You might remain in the good little black cellar an
unpleasantly long time before you were found,'' the man went on,
quite coolly. ``Do you remember the peasants who came to see
your father two nights before you left?''
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``By the time it was discovered that the house was empty and
people came in to make sure, you might be too weak to call out
and attract their attention. Did you go to Budapest from Vienna,
and were you there for three months?'' asked the inquisitor.
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``You are too good for the little black cellar,'' put in the
Lovely Person. ``I like you. Don't go into it!''
``I know nothing,'' Marco answered, but the eyes which were like
Loristan's gave her just such a look as Loristan would have given
her, and she felt it. It made her uncomfortable.
``I don't believe you were ever ill-treated or beaten,'' she
said. ``I tell you, the little black cellar will be a hard
thing. Don't go there!''
And this time Marco said nothing, but looked at her still as if
he were some great young noble who was very proud.
He knew that every word the bearded man had spoken was true. To
cry out would be of no use. If they went away and left him
behind them, there was no knowing how many days would pass before
the people of the neighborhood would begin to suspect that the
place had been deserted, or how long it would be before it
occurred to some one to give warning to the owner. And in the
meantime, neither his father nor Lazarus nor The Rat would have
the faintest reason for guessing where he was. And he would be
sitting alone in the dark in the wine-cellar. He did not know in
the least what to do about this thing. He only knew that silence
was still the order.
``It is a jet-black little hole,'' the man said. ``You might
crack your throat in it, and no one would hear. Did men come to
talk with your father in the middle of the night when you were in
Vienna?''
``I know nothing,'' said Marco.
``He won't tell,'' said the Lovely Person. ``I am sorry for this
boy.''
``He may tell after he has sat in the good little black
wine-cellar for a few hours,'' said the man with the pointed
beard. ``Come with me!''
He put his powerful hand on Marco's shoulder and pushed him
before him. Marco made no struggle. He remembered what his
father had said about the game not being a game. It wasn't a
game now, but somehow he had a strong haughty feeling of not
being afraid.
He was taken through the hallway, toward the rear, and down the
commonplace flagged steps which led to the basement. Then he was
marched through a narrow, ill-lighted, flagged passage to a door
in the wall. The door was not locked and stood a trifle ajar.
His companion pushed it farther open and showed part of a winecellar
which was so dark that it was only the shelves nearest the
door that Marco could faintly see. His captor pushed him in and
shut the door. It was as black a hole as he had described.
Marco stood still in the midst of darkness like black velvet.
His guard turned the key.
``The peasants who came to your father in Moscow spoke Samavian
and were big men. Do you remember them?'' he asked from outside.
``I know nothing,'' answered Marco.
``You are a young fool,'' the voice replied. ``And I believe you
know even more than we thought. Your father will be greatly
troubled when you do not come home. I will come back to see you
in a few hours, if it is possible. I will tell you, however,
that I have had disturbing news which might make it necessary for
us to leave the house in a hurry. I might not have time to come
down here again before leaving.''
Marco stood with his back against a bit of wall and remained
silent.
There was stillness for a few minutes, and then there was to be
heard the sound of footsteps marching away.
When the last distant echo died all was quite silent, and Marco
drew a long breath. Unbelievable as it may appear, it was in one
sense almost a breath of relief. In the rush of strange feeling
which had swept over him when he found himself facing the
astounding situation up-stairs, it had not been easy to realize
what his thoughts really were; there were so many of them and
they came so fast. How could he quite believe the evidence of
his eyes and ears? A few minutes, only a few minutes, had
changed his prettily grateful and kindly acquaintance into a
subtle and cunning creature whose love for Samavia had been part
of a plot to harm it and to harm his father.
What did she and her companion want to do--what could they do if
they knew the things they were trying to force him to tell?
Marco braced his back against the wall stoutly.
``What will it be best to think about first?''
This he said because one of the most absorbingly fascinating
things he and his father talked about together was the power of
the thoughts which human beings allow to pass through their
minds--the strange strength of them. When they talked of this,
Marco felt as if he were listening to some marvelous Eastern
story of magic which was true. In Loristan's travels, he had
visited the far Oriental countries, and he had seen and learned
many things which seemed marvels, and they had taught him deep
thinking. He had known, and reasoned through days with men who
believed that when they desired a thing, clear and exalted
thought would bring it to them. He had discovered why they
believed this, and had learned to understand their profound
arguments.
What he himself believed, he had taught Marco quite simply from
his childhood. It was this: he himself--Marco, with the strong
boy-body, the thick mat of black hair, and the patched clothes--
was the magician. He held and waved his wand himself--and his
wand was his own Thought. When special privation or anxiety
beset them, it was their rule to say, ``What will it be best to
think about first?'' which was Marco's reason for saying it to
himself now as he stood in the darkness which was like black
velvet.
He waited a few minutes for the right thing to come to him.
``I will think of the very old hermit who lived on the ledge of
the mountains in India and who let my father talk to him through
all one night,'' he said at last. This had been a wonderful
story and one of his favorites. Loristan had traveled far to see
this ancient Buddhist, and what he had seen and heard during that
one night had made changes in his life. The part of the story
which came back to Marco now was these words:
``Let pass through thy mind, my son, only the image thou wouldst
desire to see a truth. Meditate only upon the wish of thy heart,
seeing first that it can injure no man and is not ignoble. Then
will it take earthly form and draw near to thee. This is the law
of that which creates.''
``I am not afraid,'' Marco said aloud. ``I shall not be afraid.
In some way I shall get out.''
This was the image he wanted most to keep steadily in his mind
--that nothing could make him afraid, and that in some way he
would get out of the wine-cellar.
He thought of this for some minutes, and said the words over
several times. He felt more like himself when he had done it.
``When my eyes are accustomed to the darkness, I shall see if
there is any little glimmer of light anywhere,'' he said next.
He waited with patience, and it seemed for some time that he saw
no glimmer at all. He put out his hands on either side of him,
and found that, on the side of the wall against which he stood,
there seemed to be no shelves. Perhaps the cellar had been used
for other purposes than the storing of wine, and, if that was
true, there might be somewhere some opening for ventilation. The
air was not bad, but then the door had not been shut tightly when
the man opened it.
``I am not afraid,'' he repeated. ``I shall not be afraid. In
some way I shall get out.''
He would not allow himself to stop and think about his father
waiting for his return. He knew that would only rouse his
emotions and weaken his courage. He began to feel his way
carefully along the wall. It reached farther than he had thought
it would.
The cellar was not so very small. He crept round it gradually,
and, when he had crept round it, he made his way across it,
keeping his hands extended before him and setting down each foot
cautiously. Then he sat down on the stone floor and thought
again, and what he thought was of the things the old Buddhist had
told his father, and that there was a way out of this place for
him, and he should somehow find it, and, before too long a time
had passed, be walking in the street again.
It was while he was thinking in this way that he felt a startling
thing. It seemed almost as if something touched him. It made
him jump, though the touch was so light and soft that it was
scarcely a touch at all, in fact he could not be sure that he had
not imagined it. He stood up and leaned against the wall again.
Perhaps the suddenness of his movement placed him at some angle
he had not reached before, or perhaps his eyes had become more
completely accustomed to the darkness, for, as he turned his head
to listen, he made a discovery: above the door there was a place
where the velvet blackness was not so dense. There was something
like a slit in the wall, though, as it did not open upon daylight
but upon the dark passage, it was not light it admitted so much
as a lesser shade of darkness. But even that was better than
nothing, and Marco drew another long breath.
``That is only the beginning. I shall find a way out,'' he said.
``I SHALL.''
He remembered reading a story of a man who, being shut by
accident in a safety vault, passed through such terrors before
his release that he believed he had spent two days and nights in
the place when he had been there only a few hours.
``His thoughts did that. I must remember. I will sit down again
and begin thinking of all the pictures in the cabinet rooms of
the Art History Museum in Vienna. It will take some time, and
then there are the others,'' he said.
It was a good plan. While he could keep his mind upon the game
which had helped him to pass so many dull hours, he could think
of nothing else, as it required close attention--and perhaps, as
the day went on, his captors would begin to feel that it was not
safe to run the risk of doing a thing as desperate as this would
be. They might think better of it before they left the house at
least. In any case, he had learned enough from Loristan to
realize that only harm could come from letting one's mind run
wild.
``A mind is either an engine with broken and flying gear, or a
giant power under control,'' was the thing they knew.
He had walked in imagination through three of the cabinet rooms
and was turning mentally into a fourth, when he found himself
starting again quite violently. This time it was not at a touch
but at a sound. Surely it was a sound. And it was in the cellar
with him. But it was the tiniest possible noise, a ghost of a
squeak and a suggestion of a movement. It came from the opposite
side of the cellar, the side where the shelves were. He looked
across in the darkness saw a light which there could be no
mistake about. It WAS a light, two lights indeed, two round
phosphorescent greenish balls. They were two eyes staring at
him. And then he heard another sound. Not a squeak this time,
but something so homely and comfortable that he actually burst
out laughing. It was a cat purring, a nice warm cat! And she
was curled up on one of the lower shelves purring to some
new-born kittens. He knew there were kittens because it was
plain now what the tiny squeak had been, and it was made plainer
by the fact that he heard another much more distinct one and then
another. They had all been asleep when he had come into the
cellar. If the mother had been awake, she had probably been very
much afraid. Afterward she had perhaps come down from her shelf
to investigate, and had passed close to him. The feeling of
relief which came upon him at this queer and simple discovery was
wonderful. It was so natural and comfortable an every-day thing
that it seemed to make spies and criminals unreal, and only
natural things possible. With a mother cat purring away among
her kittens, even a dark wine-cellar was not so black. He got up
and kneeled by the shelf. The greenish eyes did not shine in an
unfriendly way. He could feel that the owner of them was a nice
big cat, and he counted four round little balls of kittens. It
was a curious delight to stroke the soft fur and talk to the
mother cat. She answered with purring, as if she liked the sense
of friendly human nearness. Marco laughed to himself.
``It's queer what a difference it makes!'' he said. ``It is
almost like finding a window.''
The mere presence of these harmless living things was
companionship. He sat down close to the low shelf and listened
to the motherly purring, now and then speaking and putting out
his hand to touch the warm fur. The phosphorescent light in the
green eyes was a comfort in itself.
``We shall get out of this--both of us,'' he said. ``We shall
not be here very long, Puss-cat.''
He was not troubled by the fear of being really hungry for some
time. He was so used to eating scantily from necessity, and to
passing long hours without food during his journeys, that he had
proved to himself that fasting is not, after all, such a
desperate ordeal as most people imagine. If you begin by
expecting to feel famished and by counting the hours between your
meals, you will begin to be ravenous. But he knew better.
The time passed slowly; but he had known it would pass slowly,
and he had made up his mind not to watch it nor ask himself
questions about it. He was not a restless boy, but, like his
father, could stand or sit or lie still. Now and then he could
hear distant rumblings of carts and vans passing in the street.
There was a certain degree of companionship in these also. He
kept his place near the cat and his hand where he could
occasionally touch her. He could lift his eyes now and then to
the place where the dim glimmer of something like light showed
itself.
Perhaps the stillness, perhaps the darkness, perhaps the purring
of the mother cat, probably all three, caused his thoughts to
begin to travel through his mind slowly and more slowly. At last
they ceased and he fell asleep. The mother cat purred for some
time, and then fell asleep herself.
XV
A SOUND IN A DREAM
Marco slept peacefully for several hours. There was nothing to
awaken him during that time. But at the end of it, his sleep was
penetrated by a definite sound. He had dreamed of hearing a
voice at a distance, and, as he tried in his dream to hear what
it said, a brief metallic ringing sound awakened him outright.
It was over by the time he was fully conscious, and at once he
realized that the voice of his dream had been a real one, and was
speaking still. It was the Lovely Person's voice, and she was
speaking rapidly, as if she were in the greatest haste. She was
speaking through the door.
``You will have to search for it,'' was all he heard. ``I have
not a moment!'' And, as he listened to her hurriedly departing
feet, there came to him with their hastening echoes the words,
``You are too good for the cellar. I like you!''
He sprang to the door and tried it, but it was still locked. The
feet ran up the cellar steps and through the upper hall, and the
front door closed with a bang. The two people had gone away, as
they had threatened. The voice had been excited as well as
hurried. Something had happened to frighten them, and they had
left the house in great haste.
Marco turned and stood with his back against the door. The cat
had awakened and she was gazing at him with her green eyes. She
began to purr encouragingly. She really helped Marco to think.
He was thinking with all his might and trying to remember.
``What did she come for? She came for something,'' he said to
himself. ``What did she say? I only heard part of it, because I
was asleep. The voice in the dream was part of it. The part I
heard was, `You will have to search for it. I have not a
moment.' And as she ran down the passage, she called back, `You
are too good for the cellar. I like you.' '' He said the words
over and over again and tried to recall exactly how they had
sounded, and also to recall the voice which had seemed to be part
of a dream but had been a real thing. Then he began to try his
favorite experiment. As he often tried the experiment of
commanding his mind to go to sleep, so he frequently experimented
on commanding it to work for him --to help him to remember, to
understand, and to argue about things clearly.
``Reason this out for me,'' he said to it now, quite naturally
and calmly. ``Show me what it means.''
What did she come for? It was certain that she was in too great
a hurry to be able, without a reason, to spare the time to come.
What was the reason? She had said she liked him. Then she came
because she liked him. If she liked him, she came to do
something which was not unfriendly. The only good thing she
could do for him was something which would help him to get out of
the cellar. She had said twice that he was too good for the
cellar. If he had been awake, he would have heard all she said
and have understood what she wanted him to do or meant to do for
him. He must not stop even to think of that. The first words he
had heard--what had they been? They had been less clear to him
than her last because he had heard them only as he was awakening.
But he thought he was sure that they had been, ``You will have to
search for it.'' Search for it. For what? He thought and
thought. What must he search for?
He sat down on the floor of the cellar and held his head in his
hands, pressing his eyes so hard that curious lights floated
before them.
``Tell me! Tell me!'' he said to that part of his being which
the Buddhist anchorite had said held all knowledge and could tell
a man everything if he called upon it in the right spirit.
And in a few minutes, he recalled something which seemed so much
a part of his sleep that he had not been sure that he had not
dreamed it. The ringing sound! He sprang up on his feet with a
little gasping shout. The ringing sound! It had been the ring
of metal, striking as it fell. Anything made of metal might have
sounded like that. She had thrown something made of metal into
the cellar. She had thrown it through the slit in the bricks
near the door. She liked him, and said he was too good for his
prison. She had thrown to him the only thing which could set him
free. She had thrown him the KEY of the cellar!
For a few minutes the feelings which surged through him were so
full of strong excitement that they set his brain in a whirl. He
knew what his father would say--that would not do. If he was to
think, he must hold himself still and not let even joy overcome
him. The key was in the black little cellar, and he must find it
in the dark. Even the woman who liked him enough to give him a
chance of freedom knew that she must not open the door and let
him out. There must be a delay. He would have to find the key
himself, and it would be sure to take time. The chances were
that they would be at a safe enough distance before he could get
out.
``I will kneel down and crawl on my hands and knees,'' he said.
``I will crawl back and forth and go over every inch of the floor
with my hands until I find it. If I go over every inch, I shall
find it.''
So he kneeled down and began to crawl, and the cat watched him
and purred.
``We shall get out, Puss-cat,'' he said to her. ``I told you we
should.''
He crawled from the door to the wall at the side of the shelves,
and then he crawled back again. The key might be quite a small
one, and it was necessary that he should pass his hands over
every inch, as he had said. The difficulty was to be sure, in
the darkness, that he did not miss an inch. Sometimes he was not
sure enough, and then he went over the ground again. He crawled
backward and forward, and he crawled forward and backward. He
crawled crosswise and lengthwise, he crawled diagonally, and he
crawled round and round. But he did not find the key. If he had
had only a little light, but he had none. He was so absorbed in
his search that he did not know he had been engaged in it for
several hours, and that it was the middle of the night. But at
last he realized that he must stop for a rest, because his knees
were beginning to feel bruised, and the skin of his hands was
sore as a result of the rubbing on the flags. The cat and her
kittens had gone to sleep and awakened again two or three times.
``But it is somewhere!'' he said obstinately. ``It is inside the
cellar. I heard something fall which was made of metal. That
was the ringing sound which awakened me.''
When he stood up, he found his body ached and he was very tired.
He stretched himself and exercised his arms and legs.
``I wonder how long I have been crawling about,'' he thought.
``But the key is in the cellar. It is in the cellar.''
He sat down near the cat and her family, and, laying his arm on
the shelf above her, rested his head on it. He began to think of
another experiment.
``I am so tired, I believe I shall go to sleep again. `Thought
which Knows All' ''--he was quoting something the hermit had said
to Loristan in their midnight talk--``Thought which Knows All!
Show me this little thing. Lead me to it when I awake.''
And he did fall asleep, sound and fast.
He did not know that he slept all the rest of the night. But he
did. When he awakened, it was daylight in the streets, and the
milk-carts were beginning to jingle about, and the early postmen
were knocking big double-knocks at front doors. The cat may have
heard the milk-carts, but the actual fact was that she herself
was hungry and wanted to go in search of food. Just as Marco
lifted his head from his arm and sat up, she jumped down from her
shelf and went to the door. She had expected to find it ajar as
it had been before. When she found it shut, she scratched at it
and was disturbed to find this of no use. Because she knew Marco
was in the cellar, she felt she had a friend who would assist
her, and she miauled appealingly.
This reminded Marco of the key.
``I will when I have found it,'' he said. ``It is inside the
cellar.''
The cat miauled again, this time very anxiously indeed. The
kittens heard her and began to squirm and squeak piteously.
``Lead me to this little thing,'' said Marco, as if speaking to
Something in the darkness about him, and he got up.
He put his hand out toward the kittens, and it touched something
lying not far from them. It must have been lying near his elbow
all night while he slept.
It was the key! It had fallen upon the shelf, and not on the
floor at all.
Marco picked it up and then stood still a moment. He made the
sign of the cross.
Then he found his way to the door and fumbled until he found the
keyhole and got the key into it. Then he turned it and pushed
the door open--and the cat ran out into the passage before him.
XVI
THE RAT TO THE RESCUE
Marco walked through the passage and into the kitchen part of the
basement. The doors were all locked, and they were solid doors.
He ran up the flagged steps and found the door at the top shut
and bolted also, and that too was a solid door. His jailers had
plainly made sure that it should take time enough for him to make
his way into the world, even after he got out of the wine-cellar.
The cat had run away to some part of the place where mice were
plentiful. Marco was by this time rather gnawingly hungry
himself. If he could get into the kitchen, he might find some
fragments of food left in a cupboard; but there was no moving the
locked door. He tried the outlet into the area, but that was
immov- able. Then he saw near it a smaller door. It was
evidently the entrance to the coal-cellar under the pavement.
This was proved by the fact that trodden coal-dust marked the
flagstones, and near it stood a scuttle with coal in it.
This coal-scuttle was the thing which might help him! Above the
area door was a small window which was supposed to light the
entry. He could not reach it, and, if he reached it, he could
not open it. He could throw pieces of coal at the glass and
break it, and then he could shout for help when people passed by.
They might not notice or understand where the shouts came from at
first, but, if he kept them up, some one's attention would be
attracted in the end.
He picked a large-sized solid piece of coal out of the heap in
the scuttle, and threw it with all his force against the grimy
glass. It smashed through and left a big hole. He threw
another, and the entire pane was splintered and fell outside into
the area. Then he saw it was broad daylight, and guessed that he
had been shut up a good many hours. There was plenty of coal in
the scuttle, and he had a strong arm and a good aim. He smashed
pane after pane, until only the framework remained. When he
shouted, there would be nothing between his voice and the street.
No one could see him, but if he could do something which would
make people slacken their pace to listen, then he could call out
that he was in the basement of the house with the broken window.
``Hallo!'' he shouted. ``Hallo! Hallo! Hallo! Hallo!''
But vehicles were passing in the street, and the passers-by were
absorbed in their own business. If they heard a sound, they did
not stop to inquire into it.
``Hallo! Hallo! I am locked in!'' yelled Marco, at the topmost
power of his lungs. ``Hallo! Hallo!''
After half an hour's shouting, he began to think that he was
wasting his strength.
``They only think it is a boy shouting,'' he said. ``Some one
will notice in time. At night, when the streets are quiet, I
might make a policeman hear. But my father does not know where
I am. He will be trying to find me--so will Lazarus--so will The
Rat. One of them might pass through this very street, as I did.
What can I do!''
A new idea flashed light upon him.
``I will begin to sing a Samavian song, and I will sing it very
loud. People nearly always stop a moment to listen to music and
find out where it comes from. And if any of my own people came
near, they would stop at once--and now and then I will shout for
help.''
Once when they had stopped to rest on Hampstead Heath, he had
sung a valiant Samavian song for The Rat. The Rat had wanted to
hear how he would sing when they went on their secret journey.
He wanted him to sing for the Squad some day, to make the thing
seem real. The Rat had been greatly excited, and had begged for
the song often. It was a stirring martial thing with a sort of
trumpet call of a chorus. Thousands of Samavians had sung it
together on their way to the battle-field, hundreds of years ago.
He drew back a step or so, and, putting his hands on his hips,
began to sing, throwing his voice upward that it might pass
through the broken window. He had a splendid and vibrant young
voice, though he knew nothing of its fine quality. Just now he
wanted only to make it loud.
In the street outside very few people were passing. An irritable
old gentleman who was taking an invalid walk quite jumped with
annoyance when the song suddenly trumpeted forth. Boys had no
right to yell in that manner. He hurried his step to get away
from the sound. Two or three other people glanced over their
shoulders, but had not time to loiter. A few others listened
with pleasure as they drew near and passed on.
``There's a boy with a fine voice,'' said one.
``What's he singing?'' said his companion. ``It sounds
foreign.''
``Don't know,'' was the reply as they went by. But at last a
young man who was a music-teacher, going to give a lesson,
hesitated and looked about him. The song was very loud and
spirited just at this moment. The music-teacher could not
understand where it came from, and paused to find out. The fact
that he stopped attracted the attention of the next comer, who
also paused.
``Who's singing?'' he asked. ``Where is he singing?''
``I can't make out,'' the music-teacher laughed. ``Sounds as if
it came out of the ground.''
And, because it was queer that a song should seem to be coming
out of the ground, a costermonger stopped, and then a little boy,
and then a workingwoman, and then a lady.
There was quite a little group when another person turned the
corner of the street. He was a shabby boy on crutches, and he
had a frantic look on his face.
And Marco actually heard, as he drew near to the group, the
tap-tap-tap of crutches.
``It might be,'' he thought. ``It might be!''
And he sang the trumpet-call of the chorus as if it were meant to
reach the skies, and he sang it again and again. And at the end
of it shouted, ``Hallo! Hallo! Hallo! Hallo! Hallo!''
The Rat swung himself into the group and looked as if he had gone
crazy. He hurled himself against the people.
``Where is he! Where is he!'' he cried, and he poured out some
breathless words; it was almost as if he sobbed them out.
``We've been looking for him all night!'' he shouted. ``Where is
he! Marco! Marco! No one else sings it but him. Marco!
Marco!'' And out of the area, as it seemed, came a shout of
answer.
``Rat! Rat! I'm here in the cellar--locked in. I'm here!'' and
a big piece of coal came hurtling through the broken window and
fell crashing on the area flags. The Rat got down the steps into
the area as if he had not been on crutches but on legs, and
banged on the door, shouting back:
``Marco! Marco! Here I am! Who locked you in? How can I get
the door open?''
Marco was close against the door inside. It was The Rat! It was
The Rat! And he would be in the street again in a few minutes.
``Call a policeman!'' he shouted through the keyhole. ``The
people locked me in on purpose and took away the keys.''
Then the group of lookers-on began to get excited and press
against the area railings and ask questions. They could not
understand what had happened to cause the boy with the crutches
to look as if he were crazy with terror and relief at the same
time.
And the little boy ran delightedly to fetch a policeman, and
found one in the next street, and, with some difficulty,
persuaded him that it was his business to come and get a door
open in an empty house where a boy who was a street singer had
got locked up in a cellar.
XVII
``IT IS A VERY BAD SIGN''
The policeman was not so much excited as out of temper. He did
not know what Marco knew or what The Rat knew. Some common lad
had got himself locked up in a house, and some one would have to
go to the landlord and get a key from him. He had no intention
of laying himself open to the law by breaking into a private
house with his truncheon, as The Rat expected him to do.
``He got himself in through some of his larks, and he'll have to
wait till he's got out without smashing locks,'' he growled,
shaking the area door. ``How did you get in there?'' he shouted.
It was not easy for Marco to explain through a keyhole that he
had come in to help a lady who had met with an accident. The
policeman thought this mere boy's talk. As to the rest of the
story, Marco knew that it could not be related at all without
saying things which could not be explained to any one but his
father. He quickly made up his mind that he must let it be
believed that he had been locked in by some queer accident. It
must be supposed that the people had not remembered, in their
haste, that he had not yet left the house.
When the young clerk from the house agency came with the keys, he
was much disturbed and bewildered after he got inside.
``They've made a bolt of it,'' he said. ``That happens now and
then, but there's something queer about this. What did they lock
these doors in the basement for, and the one on the stairs? What
did they say to you?'' he asked Marco, staring at him
suspiciously.
``They said they were obliged to go suddenly,'' Marco answered.
``What were you doing in the basement?''
``The man took me down.''
``And left you there and bolted? He must have been in a hurry.''
``The lady said they had not a moment's time.''
``Her ankle must have got well in short order,'' said the young
man.
``I knew nothing about them,'' answered Marco. ``I had never
seen them before.''
``The police were after them,'' the young man said. ``That's
what I should say. They paid three months' rent in advance, and
they have only been here two. Some of these foreign spies
lurking about London; that's what they were.''
The Rat had not waited until the keys arrived. He had swung
himself at his swiftest pace back through the streets to No. 7
Philibert Place. People turned and stared at his wild pale face
as he almost shot past them.
He had left himself barely breath enough to speak with when he
reached the house and banged on the door with his crutch to save
time.
Both Loristan and Lazarus came to answer.
The Rat leaned against the door gasping.
``He's found! He's all right!'' he panted. ``Some one had
locked him in a house and left him. They've sent for the keys.
I'm going back. Brandon Terrace, No. 10.''
Loristan and Lazarus exchanged glances. Both of them were at the
moment as pale as The Rat.
``Help him into the house,'' said Loristan to Lazarus. ``He must
stay here and rest. We will go.'' The Rat knew it was an order.
He did not like it, but he obeyed.
``This is a bad sign, Master,'' said Lazarus, as they went out
together.
``It is a very bad one,'' answered Loristan.
``God of the Right, defend us!'' Lazarus groaned.
``Amen!'' said Loristan. ``Amen!''
The group had become a small crowd by the time they reached
Brandon Terrace. Marco had not found it easy to leave the place
because he was being questioned. Neither the policeman nor the
agent's clerk seemed willing to relinquish the idea that he could
give them some information about the absconding pair.
The entrance of Loristan produced its usual effect. The agent's
clerk lifted his hat, and the policeman stood straight and made
salute. Neither of them realized that the tall man's clothes
were worn and threadbare. They felt only that a personage was
before them, and that it was not possible to question his air of
absolute and serene authority. He laid his hand on Marco's
shoulder and held it there as he spoke. When Marco looked up at
him and felt the closeness of his touch, it seemed as if it were
an embrace-- as if he had caught him to his breast.
``My boy knew nothing of these people,'' he said. ``That I can
guarantee. He had seen neither of them before. His entering the
house was the result of no boyish trick. He has been shut up in
this place for nearly twenty-four hours and has had no food. I
must take him home. This is my address.'' He handed the young
man a card.
Then they went home together, and all the way to Philibert Place
Loristan's firm hand held closely to his boy's shoulder as if he
could not endure to let him go. But on the way they said very
little.
``Father,'' Marco said, rather hoarsely, when they first got away
from the house in the terrace, ``I can't talk well in the street.
For one thing, I am so glad to be with you again. It seemed as
if--it might turn out badly.''
``Beloved one,'' Loristan said the words in their own Samavian,
``until you are fed and at rest, you shall not talk at all.''
Afterward, when he was himself again and was allowed to tell his
strange story, Marco found that both his father and Lazarus had
at once had suspicions when he had not returned. They knew no
ordinary event could have kept him. They were sure that he must
have been detained against his will, and they were also sure
that, if he had been so detained, it could only have been for
reasons they could guess at.
``This was the card that she gave me,'' Marco said, and he handed
it to Loristan. ``She said you would remember the name.''
Loristan looked at the lettering with an ironic half-smile.
``I never heard it before,'' he replied. ``She would not send me
a name I knew. Probably I have never seen either of them. But I
know the work they do. They are spies of the Maranovitch, and
suspect that I know something of the Lost Prince. They believed
they could terrify you into saying things which would be a clue.
Men and women of their class will use desperate means to gain
their end.''
``Might they--have left me as they threatened?'' Marco asked him.
``They would scarcely have dared, I think. Too great a hue and
cry would have been raised by the discovery of such a crime. Too
many detectives would have been set at work to track them.''
But the look in his father's eyes as he spoke, and the pressure
of the hand he stretched out to touch him, made Marco's heart
thrill. He had won a new love and trust from his father. When
they sat together and talked that night, they were closer to each
other's souls than they had ever been before.
They sat in the firelight, Marco upon the worn hearth-rug, and
they talked about Samavia--about the war and its heart-rending
struggles, and about how they might end.
``Do you think that some time we might be exiles no longer?'' the
boy said wistfully. ``Do you think we might go there together
--and see it--you and I, Father?''
There was a silence for a while. Loristan looked into the
sinking bed of red coal.
``For years--for years I have made for my soul that image,'' he
said slowly. ``When I think of my friend on the side of the
Himalayan Mountains, I say, `The Thought which Thought the World
may give us that also!' ''
XVIII
``CITIES AND FACES''
The hours of Marco's unexplained absence had been terrible to
Loristan and to Lazarus. They had reason for fears which it was
not possible for them to express. As the night drew on, the
fears took stronger form. They forgot the existence of The Rat,
who sat biting his nails in the bedroom, afraid to go out lest he
might lose the chance of being given some errand to do but also
afraid to show himself lest he should seem in the way.
``I'll stay upstairs,'' he had said to Lazarus. ``If you just
whistle, I'll come.''
The anguish he passed through as the day went by and Lazarus went
out and came in and he himself received no orders, could not
have been expressed in any ordinary words. He writhed in his
chair, he bit his nails to the quick, he wrought himself into a
frenzy of misery and terror by recalling one by one all the
crimes his knowledge of London police-courts supplied him with.
He was doing nothing, yet he dare not leave his post. It was his
post after all, though they had not given it to him. He must do
something.
In the middle of the night Loristan opened the door of the back
sitting-room, because he knew he must at least go upstairs and
throw himself upon his bed even if he could not sleep.
He started back as the door opened. The Rat was sitting huddled
on the floor near it with his back against the wall. He had a
piece of paper in his hand and his twisted face was a weird thing
to see.
``Why are you here?'' Loristan asked.
``I've been here three hours, sir. I knew you'd have to come out
sometime and I thought you'd let me speak to you. Will you--
will you?''
``Come into the room,'' said Loristan. ``I will listen to
anything you want to say. What have you been drawing on that
paper?'' as The Rat got up in the wonderful way he had taught
himself. The paper was covered with lines which showed it to be
another of his plans.
``Please look at it,'' he begged. ``I daren't go out lest you
might want to send me somewhere. I daren't sit doing nothing. I
began remembering and thinking things out. I put down all the
streets and squares he MIGHT have walked through on his way home.
I've not missed one. If you'll let me start out and walk through
every one of them and talk to the policemen on the beat and look
at the houses--and think out things and work at them--I'll not
miss an inch--I'll not miss a brick or a flagstone--I'll--'' His
voice had a hard sound but it shook, and he himself shook.
Loristan touched his arm gently.
``You are a good comrade,'' he said. ``It is well for us that
you are here. You have thought of a good thing.''
``May I go now?'' said The Rat.
``This moment, if you are ready,'' was the answer. The Rat swung
himself to the door.
Loristan said to him a thing which was like the sudden lighting
of a great light in the very center of his being.
``You are one of us. Now that I know you are doing this I may
even sleep. You are one of us.'' And it was because he was
following this plan that The Rat had turned into Brandon Terrace
and heard the Samavian song ringing out from the locked basement
of Number 10.
``Yes, he is one of us,'' Loristan said, when he told this part
of the story to Marco as they sat by the fire. ``I had not been
sure before. I wanted to be very sure. Last night I saw into
the depths of him and KNEW. He may be trusted.''
From that day The Rat held a new place. Lazarus himself,
strangely enough, did not resent his holding it. The boy was
allowed to be near Loristan as he had never dared to hope to be
near. It was not merely that he was allowed to serve him in many
ways, but he was taken into the intimacy which had before
enclosed only the three. Loristan talked to him as he talked to
Marco, drawing him within the circle which held so much that was
comprehended without speech. The Rat knew that he was being
trained and observed and he realized it with exaltation. His
idol had said that he was ``one of them'' and he was watching and
putting him to tests so that he might find out how much he was
one of them. And he was doing it for some grave reason of his
own. This thought possessed The Rat's whole mind. Perhaps he
was wondering if he should find out that he was to be trusted, as
a rock is to be trusted. That he should even think that perhaps
he might find that he was like a rock, was inspiration enough.
``Sir,'' he said one night when they were alone together, because
The Rat had been copying a road-map. His voice was very low--
``do you think that--sometime--you could trust me as you trust
Marco? Could it ever be like that--ever?''
``The time has come,'' and Loristan's voice was almost as low as
his own, though strong and deep feeling underlay its quiet--
``the time has come when I can trust you with Marco--to be his
companion--to care for him, to stand by his side at any moment.
And Marco is--Marco is my son.'' That was enough to uplift The
Rat to the skies. But there was more to follow.
``It may not be long before it may be his part to do work in
which he will need a comrade who can be trusted--as a rock can be
trusted.''
He had said the very words The Rat's own mind had given to him.
``A Rock! A Rock!'' the boy broke out. ``Let me show you, sir.
Send me with him for a servant. The crutches are nothing.
You've seen that they're as good as legs, haven't you? I've
trained myself.''
``I know, I know, dear lad.'' Marco had told him all of it. He
gave him a gracious smile which seemed as if it held a sort of
fine secret. ``You shall go as his aide-de-camp. It shall be
part of the game.''
He had always encouraged ``the game,'' and during the last weeks
had even found time to help them in their plannings for the
mysterious journey of the Secret Two. He had been so interested
that once or twice he had called on Lazarus as an old soldier and
Samavian to give his opinions of certain routes--and of the
customs and habits of people in towns and villages by the way.
Here they would find simple pastoral folk who danced, sang after
their day's work, and who would tell all they knew; here they
would find those who served or feared the Maranovitch and who
would not talk at all. In one place they would meet with
hospitality, in another with unfriendly suspicion of all
strangers. Through talk and stories The Rat began to know the
country almost as Marco knew it. That was part of the game
too--because it was always ``the game,'' they called it. Another
part was The Rat's training of his memory, and bringing home his
proofs of advance at night when he returned from his walk and
could describe, or recite, or roughly sketch all he had seen in
his passage from one place to another. Marco's part was to
recall and sketch faces. Loristan one night gave him a number of
photographs of people to commit to memory. Under each face was
written the name of a place.
``Learn these faces,'' he said, ``until you would know each one
of them at once wheresoever you met it. Fix them upon your mind,
so that it will be impossible for you to forget them. You must
be able to sketch any one of them and recall the city or town or
neighborhood connected with it.''
Even this was still called ``the game,'' but Marco began to know
in his secret heart that it was so much more, that his hand
sometimes trembled with excitement as he made his sketches over
and over again. To make each one many times was the best way to
imbed it in his memory. The Rat knew, too, though he had no
reason for knowing, but mere instinct. He used to lie awake in
the night and think it over and remember what Loristan had said
of the time coming when Marco might need a comrade in his work.
What was his work to be? It was to be something like ``the
game.'' And they were being prepared for it. And though Marco
often lay awake on his bed when The Rat lay awake on his sofa,
neither boy spoke to the other of the thing his mind dwelt on.
And Marco worked as he had never worked before. The game was
very exciting when he could prove his prowess. The four gathered
together at night in the back sitting-room. Lazarus was obliged
to be with them because a second judge was needed. Loristan
would mention the name of a place, perhaps a street in Paris or a
hotel in Vienna, and Marco would at once make a rapid sketch of
the face under whose photograph the name of the locality had been
written. It was not long before he could begin his sketch
without more than a moment's hesitation. And yet even when this
had become the case, they still played the game night after
night. There was a great hotel near the Place de la Concorde in
Paris, of which Marco felt he should never hear the name during
all his life without there starting up before his mental vision a
tall woman with fierce black eyes and a delicate high-bridged
nose across which the strong eyebrows almost met. In Vienna
there was a palace which would always bring back at once a pale
cold-faced man with a heavy blonde lock which fell over his
forehead. A certain street in Munich meant a stout genial old
aristocrat with a sly smile; a village in Bavaria, a peasant with
a vacant and simple countenance. A curled and smoothed man who
looked like a hair-dresser brought up a place in an Austrian
mountain town. He knew them all as he knew his own face and No.
7 Philibert Place.
But still night after night the game was played.
Then came a night when, out of a deep sleep, he was awakened by
Lazarus touching him. He had so long been secretly ready to
answer any call that he sat up straight in bed at the first
touch.
``Dress quickly and come down stairs,'' Lazarus said. ``The
Prince is here and wishes to speak with you.''
Marco made no answer but got out of bed and began to slip on his
clothes.
Lazarus touched The Rat.
The Rat was as ready as Marco and sat upright as he had done.
``Come down with the young Master,'' he commanded. ``It is
necessary that you should be seen and spoken to.'' And having
given the order he went away.
No one heard the shoeless feet of the two boys as they stole down
the stairs.
An elderly man in ordinary clothes, but with an unmistakable
face, was sitting quietly talking to Loristan who with a gesture
called both forward.
``The Prince has been much interested in what I have told him of
your game,'' he said in his lowest voice. ``He wishes to see you
make your sketches, Marco.''
Marco looked very straight into the Prince's eyes which were
fixed intently on him as he made his bow.
``His Highness does me honor,'' he said, as his father might have
said it. He went to the table at once and took from a drawer his
pencils and pieces of cardboard.
``I should know he was your son and a Samavian,'' the Prince
remarked.
Then his keen and deep-set eyes turned themselves on the boy with
the crutches.
``This,'' said Loristan, ``is the one who calls himself The Rat.
He is one of us.''
The Rat saluted.
``Please tell him, sir,'' he whispered, ``that the crutches don't
matter.''
``He has trained himself to an extraordinary activity,'' Loristan
said. ``He can do anything.''
The keen eyes were still taking The Rat in.
``They are an advantage,'' said the Prince at last.
Lazarus had nailed together a light, rough easel which Marco used
in making his sketches when the game was played. Lazarus was
standing in state at the door, and he came forward, brought the
easel from its corner, and arranged the necessary drawing
materials upon it.
Marco stood near it and waited the pleasure of his father and his
visitor. They were speaking together in low tones and he waited
several minutes. What The Rat noticed was what he had noticed
before--that the big boy could stand still in perfect ease and
silence. It was not necessary for him to say things or to ask
questions-- to look at people as if he felt restless if they did
not speak to or notice him. He did not seem to require notice,
and The Rat felt vaguely that, young as he was, this very freedom
from any anxiety to be looked at or addressed made him somehow
look like a great gentleman.
Loristan and the Prince advanced to where he stood.
``L'Hotel de Marigny,'' Loristan said.
Marco began to sketch rapidly. He began the portrait of the
handsome woman with the delicate high-bridged nose and the black
brows which almost met. As he did it, the Prince drew nearer and
watched the work over his shoulder. It did not take very long
and, when it was finished, the inspector turned, and after giving
Loristan a long and strange look, nodded twice.
``It is a remarkable thing,'' he said. ``In that rough sketch
she is not to be mistaken.''
Loristan bent his head.
Then he mentioned the name of another street in another place
--and Marco sketched again. This time it was the peasant with
the simple face. The Prince bowed again. Then Loristan gave
another name, and after that another and another; and Marco did
his work until it was at an end, and Lazarus stood near with a
handful of sketches which he had silently taken charge of as each
was laid aside.
``You would know these faces wheresoever you saw them?'' said the
Prince. ``If you passed one in Bond Street or in the Marylebone
Road, you would recognize it at once?''
``As I know yours, sir,'' Marco answered.
Then followed a number of questions. Loristan asked them as he
had often asked them before. They were questions as to the
height and build of the originals of the pictures, of the color
of their hair and eyes, and the order of their complexions.
Marco answered them all. He knew all but the names of these
people, and it was plainly not necessary that he should know
them, as his father had never uttered them.
After this questioning was at an end the Prince pointed to The
Rat who had leaned on his crutches against the wall, his eyes
fiercely eager like a ferret's.
``And he?'' the Prince said. ``What can he do?''
``Let me try,'' said The Rat. ``Marco knows.''
Marco looked at his father.
``May I help him to show you?'' he asked.
``Yes,'' Loristan answered, and then, as he turned to the Prince,
he said again in his low voice: ``HE IS ONE OF US.''
Then Marco began a new form of the game. He held up one of the
pictured faces before The Rat, and The Rat named at once the city
and place connected with it, he detailed the color of eyes and
hair, the height, the build, all the personal details as Marco
himself had detailed them. To these he added descriptions of the
cities, and points concerning the police system, the palaces, the
people. His face twisted itself, his eyes burned, his voice
shook, but he was amazing in his readiness of reply and his
exactness of memory.
``I can't draw,'' he said at the end. ``But I can remember. I
didn't want any one to be bothered with thinking I was trying to
learn it. So only Marco knew.''
This he said to Loristan with appeal in his voice.
``It was he who invented `the game,' '' said Loristan. ``I
showed you his strange maps and plans.''
``It is a good game,'' the Prince answered in the manner of a man
extraordinarily interested and impressed. ``They know it well.
They can be trusted.''
``No such thing has ever been done before,'' Loristan said. ``It
is as new as it is daring and simple.''
``Therein lies its safety,'' the Prince answered.
``Perhaps only boyhood,'' said Loristan, ``could have dared to
imagine it.''
``The Prince thanks you,'' he said after a few more words spoken
aside to his visitor. ``We both thank you. You may go back to
your beds.''
And the boys went.
XIX
``THAT IS ONE!''
A week had not passed before Marco brought to The Rat in their
bedroom an envelope containing a number of slips of paper on each
of which was written something.
``This is another part of the game,'' he said gravely. ``Let us
sit down together by the table and study it.''
They sat down and examined what was written on the slips. At the
head of each was the name of one of the places with which Marco
had connected a face he had sketched. Below were clear and
concise directions as to how it was to be reached and the words
to be said when each individual was encountered.
``This person is to be found at his stall in the market,'' was
written of the vacant-faced peasant. ``You will first attract
his attention by asking the price of something. When he is
looking at you, touch your left thumb lightly with the forefinger
of your right hand. Then utter in a low distinct tone the words
`The Lamp is lighted.' That is all you are to do.''
Sometimes the directions were not quite so simple, but they were
all instructions of the same order. The originals of the
sketches were to be sought out--always with precaution which
should conceal that they were being sought at all, and always in
such a manner as would cause an encounter to appear to be mere
chance. Then certain words were to be uttered, but always
without attracting the attention of any bystander or passer-by.
The boys worked at their task through the entire day. They
concentrated all their powers upon it. They wrote and re-wrote
--they repeated to each other what they committed to memory as if
it were a lesson. Marco worked with the greater ease and more
rapidly, because exercise of this order had been his practice and
entertainment from his babyhood. The Rat, however, almost kept
pace with him, as he had been born with a phenomenal memory and
his eagerness and desire were a fury.
But throughout the entire day neither of them once referred to
what they were doing as anything but ``the game.''
At night, it is true, each found himself lying awake and
thinking. It was The Rat who broke the silence from his sofa.
``It is what the messengers of the Secret Party would be ordered
to do when they were sent out to give the Sign for the Rising,''
he said. ``I made that up the first day I invented the party,
didn't I?''
``Yes,'' answered Marco.
After a third day's concentration they knew by heart everything
given to them to learn. That night Loristan put them through an
examination.
``Can you write these things?'' he asked, after each had repeated
them and emerged safely from all cross-questioning.
Each boy wrote them correctly from memory.
``Write yours in French--in German--in Russian--in Samavian,''
Loristan said to Marco.
``All you have told me to do and to learn is part of myself,
Father,'' Marco said in the end. ``It is part of me, as if it
were my hand or my eyes--or my heart.''
``I believe that is true,'' answered Loristan.
He was pale that night and there was a shadow on his face. His
eyes held a great longing as they rested on Marco. It was a
yearning which had a sort of dread in it.
Lazarus also did not seem quite himself. He was red instead of
pale, and his movements were uncertain and restless. He cleared
his throat nervously at intervals and more than once left his
chair as if to look for something.
It was almost midnight when Loristan, standing near Marco, put
his arm round his shoulders.
``The Game''--he began, and then was silent a few moments while
Marco felt his arm tighten its hold. Both Marco and The Rat felt
a hard quick beat in their breasts, and, because of this and
because the pause seemed long, Marco spoke.
``The Game--yes, Father?'' he said.
``The Game is about to give you work to do--both of you,''
Loristan answered.
Lazarus cleared his throat and walked to the easel in the corner
of the room. But he only changed the position of a piece of
drawing- paper on it and then came back.
``In two days you are to go to Paris--as you,'' to The Rat,
``planned in the game.''
``As I planned?'' The Rat barely breathed the words.
``Yes,'' answered Loristan. ``The instructions you have learned
you will carry out. There is no more to be done than to manage
to approach certain persons closely enough to be able to utter
certain words to them.''
``Only two young strollers whom no man could suspect,'' put in
Lazarus in an astonishingly rough and shaky voice. ``They could
pass near the Emperor himself without danger. The young
Master--'' his voice became so hoarse that he was obligated to
clear it loudly--``the young Master must carry himself less
finely. It would be well to shuffle a little and slouch as if he
were of the common people.''
``Yes,'' said The Rat hastily. ``He must do that. I can teach
him. He holds his head and his shoulders like a gentleman. He
must look like a street lad.''
``I will look like one,'' said Marco, with determination.
``I will trust you to remind him,'' Loristan said to The Rat, and
he said it with gravity. ``That will be your charge.''
As he lay upon his pillow that night, it seemed to Marco as if a
load had lifted itself from his heart. It was the load of
uncertainty and longing. He had so long borne the pain of
feeling that he was too young to be allowed to serve in any way.
His dreams had never been wild ones--they had in fact always been
boyish and modest, howsoever romantic. But now no dream which
could have passed through his brain would have seemed so
wonderful as this--that the hour had come--the hour had come--and
that he, Marco, was to be its messenger. He was to do no
dramatic deed and be announced by no flourish of heralds. No one
would know what he did. What he achieved could only be attained
if he remained obscure and unknown and seemed to every one only a
common ordinary boy who knew nothing whatever of important
things. But his father had given to him a gift so splendid that
he trembled with awe and joy as he thought of it. The Game had
become real. He and The Rat were to carry with them The Sign,
and it would be like carrying a tiny lamp to set aflame lights
which would blaze from one mountain-top to another until half the
world seemed on fire.
As he had awakened out of his sleep when Lazarus touched him, so
he awakened in the middle of the night again. But he was not
aroused by a touch. When he opened his eyes he knew it was a
look which had penetrated his sleep--a look in the eyes of his
father who was standing by his side. In the road outside there
was the utter silence he had noticed the night of the Prince's
first visit--the only light was that of the lamp in the street,
but he could see Loristan's face clearly enough to know that the
mere intensity of his gaze had awakened him. The Rat was
sleeping profoundly. Loristan spoke in Samavian and under his
breath.
``Beloved one,'' he said. ``You are very young. Because I am
your father--just at this hour I can feel nothing else. I have
trained you for this through all the years of your life. I am
proud of your young maturity and strength but--Beloved--you are a
child! Can I do this thing!''
For the moment, his face and his voice were scarcely like his
own.
He kneeled by the bedside, and, as he did it, Marco half sitting
up caught his hand and held it hard against his breast.
``Father, I know!'' he cried under his breath also. ``It is
true. I am a child but am I not a man also? You yourself said
it. I always knew that you were teaching me to be one--for some
reason. It was my secret that I knew it. I learned well because
I never forgot it. And I learned. Did I not?''
He was so eager that he looked more like a boy than ever. But
his young strength and courage were splendid to see. Loristan
knew him through and through and read every boyish thought of
his.
``Yes,'' he answered slowly. ``You did your part--and now if I
--drew back--you would feel that I HAD FAILED YOU-FAILED YOU.''
``You!'' Marco breathed it proudly. ``You COULD not fail even
the weakest thing in the world.''
There was a moment's silence in which the two pairs of eyes dwelt
on each other with the deepest meaning, and then Loristan rose to
his feet.
``The end will be all that our hearts most wish,'' he said.
``To- morrow you may begin the new part of `the Game.' You may
go to Paris.''
When the train which was to meet the boat that crossed from Dover
to Calais steamed out of the noisy Charing Cross Station, it
carried in a third-class carriage two shabby boys. One of them
would have been a handsome lad if he had not carried himself
slouchingly and walked with a street lad's careless shuffling
gait. The other was a cripple who moved slowly, and apparently
with difficulty, on crutches. There was nothing remarkable or
picturesque enough about them to attract attention. They sat in
the corner of the carriage and neither talked much nor seemed to
be particularly interested in the journey or each other. When
they went on board the steamer, they were soon lost among the
commoner passengers and in fact found for themselves a secluded
place which was not advantageous enough to be wanted by any one
else.
``What can such a poor-looking pair of lads be going to Paris
for?'' some one asked his companion.
``Not for pleasure, certainly; perhaps to get work,'' was the
casual answer.
In the evening they reached Paris, and Marco led the way to a
small cafe in a side-street where they got some cheap food. In
the same side-street they found a bed they could share for the
night in a tiny room over a baker's shop.
The Rat was too much excited to be ready to go to bed early. He
begged Marco to guide him about the brilliant streets. They went
slowly along the broad Avenue des Champs Elysees under the lights
glittering among the horse-chestnut trees. The Rat's sharp eyes
took it all in--the light of the cafes among the embowering
trees, the many carriages rolling by, the people who loitered and
laughed or sat at little tables drinking wine and listening to
music, the broad stream of life which flowed on to the Arc de
Triomphe and back again.
``It's brighter and clearer than London,'' he said to Marco.
``The people look as if they were having more fun than they do in
England.''
The Place de la Concorde spreading its stately spaces--a world of
illumination, movement, and majestic beauty--held him as though
by a fascination. He wanted to stand and stare at it, first from
one point of view and then from another. It was bigger and more
wonderful than he had been able to picture it when Marco had
described it to him and told him of the part it had played in the
days of the French Revolution when the guillotine had stood in it
and the tumbrils had emptied themselves at the foot of its steps.
He stood near the Obelisk a long time without speaking.
``I can see it all happening,'' he said at last, and he pulled
Marco away.
Before they returned home, they found their way to a large house
which stood in a courtyard. In the iron work of the handsome
gates which shut it in was wrought a gilded coronet. The gates
were closed and the house was not brightly lighted.
They walked past it and round it without speaking, but, when they
neared the entrance for the second time, The Rat said in a low
tone:
``She is five feet seven, has black hair, a nose with a high
bridge, her eyebrows are black and almost meet across it, she has
a pale olive skin and holds her head proudly.''
``That is the one,'' Marco answered.
They were a week in Paris and each day passed this big house.
There were certain hours when great ladies were more likely to go
out and come in than they were at others. Marco knew this, and
they managed to be within sight of the house or to pass it at
these hours. For two days they saw no sign of the person they
wished to see, but one morning the gates were thrown open and
they saw flowers and palms being taken in.
``She has been away and is coming back,'' said Marco. The next
day they passed three times--once at the hour when fashionable
women drive out to do their shopping, once at the time when
afternoon visiting is most likely to begin, and once when the
streets were brilliant with lights and the carriages had begun to
roll by to dinner- parties and theaters.
Then, as they stood at a little distance from the iron gates, a
carriage drove through them and stopped before the big open door
which was thrown open by two tall footmen in splendid livery.
``She is coming out,'' said The Rat.
They would be able to see her plainly when she came, because the
lights over the entrance were so bright.
Marco slipped from under his coat sleeve a carefully made sketch.
He looked at it and The Rat looked at it.
A footman stood erect on each side of the open door. The footman
who sat with the coachman had got down and was waiting by the
carriage. Marco and The Rat glanced again with furtive haste at
the sketch. A handsome woman appeared upon the threshold. She
paused and gave some order to the footman who stood on the right.
Then she came out in the full light and got into the carriage
which drove out of the courtyard and quite near the place where
the two boys waited.
When it was gone, Marco drew a long breath as he tore the sketch
into very small pieces indeed. He did not throw them away but
put them into his pocket.
The Rat drew a long breath also.
``Yes,'' he said positively.
``Yes,'' said Marco.
When they were safely shut up in their room over the baker's
shop, they discussed the chances of their being able to pass her
in such a way as would seem accidental. Two common boys could
not enter the courtyard. There was a back entrance for
tradespeople and messengers. When she drove, she would always
enter her carriage from the same place. Unless she sometimes
walked, they could not approach her. What should be done? The
thing was difficult. After they had talked some time, The Rat
sat and gnawed his nails.
``To-morrow afternoon,'' he broke out at last, ``we'll watch and
see if her carriage drives in for her--then, when she comes to
the door, I'll go in and begin to beg. The servant will think
I'm a foreigner and don't know what I'm doing. You can come
after me to tell me to come away, because you know better than I
do that I shall be ordered out. She may be a good-natured woman
and listen to us --and you might get near her.''
``We might try it,'' Marco answered. ``It might work. We will
try it.''
The Rat never failed to treat him as his leader. He had begged
Loristan to let him come with Marco as his servant, and his
servant he had been more than willing to be. When Loristan had
said he should be his aide-de-camp, he had felt his trust lifted
to a military dignity which uplifted him with it. As his
aide-de-camp he must serve him, watch him, obey his lightest
wish, make everything easy for him. Sometimes, Marco was
troubled by the way in which he insisted on serving him, this
queer, once dictatorial and cantankerous lad who had begun by
throwing stones at him.
``You must not wait on me,'' he said to him. ``I must wait upon
myself.''
The Rat rather flushed.
``He told me that he would let me come with you as your aide-de
camp,'' he said. ``It--it's part of the game. It makes things
easier if we keep up the game.''
It would have attracted attention if they had spent too much time
in the vicinity of the big house. So it happened that the next
afternoon the great lady evidently drove out at an hour when they
were not watching for her. They were on their way to try if they
could carry out their plan, when, as they walked together along
the Rue Royale, The Rat suddenly touched Marco's elbow.
``The carriage stands before the shop with lace in the windows,''
he whispered hurriedly.
Marco saw and recognized it at once. The owner had evidently
gone into the shop to buy something. This was a better chance
than they had hoped for, and, when they approached the carriage
itself, they saw that there was another point in their favor.
Inside were no less than three beautiful little Pekingese
spaniels that looked exactly alike. They were all trying to look
out of the window and were pushing against each other. They were
so perfect and so pretty that few people passed by without
looking at them. What better excuse could two boys have for
lingering about a place?
They stopped and, standing a little distance away, began to look
at and discuss them and laugh at their excited little antics.
Through the shop-window Marco caught a glimpse of the great lady.
``She does not look much interested. She won't stay long,'' he
whispered, and added aloud, ``that little one is the master. See
how he pushes the others aside! He is stronger than the other
two, though he is so small.''
``He can snap, too,'' said The Rat.
``She is coming now,'' warned Marco, and then laughed aloud as if
at the Pekingese, which, catching sight of their mistress at the
shop-door, began to leap and yelp for joy.
Their mistress herself smiled, and was smiling as Marco drew near
her.
``May we look at them, Madame?'' he said in French, and, as she
made an amiable gesture of acquiescence and moved toward the
carriage with him, he spoke a few words, very low but very
distinctly, in Russian.
``The Lamp is lighted,'' he said.
The Rat was looking at her keenly, but he did not see her face
change at all. What he noticed most throughout their journey was
that each person to whom they gave the Sign had complete control
over his or her countenance, if there were bystanders, and never
betrayed by any change of expression that the words meant
anything unusual.
The great lady merely went on smiling, and spoke only of the
dogs, allowing Marco and himself to look at them through the
window of the carriage as the footman opened the door for her to
enter.
``They are beautiful little creatures,'' Marco said, lifting his
cap, and, as the footman turned away, he uttered his few Russian
words once more and moved off without even glancing at the lady
again.
``That is ONE!'' he said to The Rat that night before they went
to sleep, and with a match he burned the scraps of the sketch he
had torn and put into his pocket.
XX
MARCO GOES TO THE OPERA
Their next journey was to Munich, but the night before they left
Paris an unexpected thing happened.
To reach the narrow staircase which led to their bedroom it was
necessary to pass through the baker's shop itself.
The baker's wife was a friendly woman who liked the two boy
lodgers who were so quiet and gave no trouble. More than once
she had given them a hot roll or so or a freshly baked little
tartlet with fruit in the center. When Marco came in this
evening, she greeted him with a nod and handed him a small parcel
as he passed through.
``This was left for you this afternoon,'' she said. ``I see you
are making purchases for your journey. My man and I are very
sorry you are going.''
``Thank you, Madame. We also are sorry,'' Marco answered, taking
the parcel. ``They are not large purchases, you see.''
But neither he nor The Rat had bought anything at all, though the
ordinary-looking little package was plainly addressed to him and
bore the name of one of the big cheap shops. It felt as if it
contained something soft.
When he reached their bedroom, The Rat was gazing out of the
window watching every living thing which passed in the street
below. He who had never seen anything but London was absorbed by
the spell of Paris and was learning it by heart.
``Something has been sent to us. Look at this,'' said Marco.
The Rat was at his side at once. ``What is it? Where did it
come from?''
They opened the package and at first sight saw only several pairs
of quite common woolen socks. As Marco took up the sock in the
middle of the parcel, he felt that there was something inside
it-- something laid flat and carefully. He put his hand in and
drew out a number of five-franc notes--not new ones, because new
ones would have betrayed themselves by crackling. These were old
enough to be soft. But there were enough of them to amount to a
substantial sum.
``It is in small notes because poor boys would have only small
ones. No one will be surprised when we change these,'' The Rat
said.
Each of them believed the package had been sent by the great
lady, but it had been done so carefully that not the slightest
clue was furnished.
To The Rat, part of the deep excitement of ``the Game'' was the
working out of the plans and methods of each person concerned.
He could not have slept without working out some scheme which
might have been used in this case. It thrilled him to
contemplate the difficulties the great lady might have found
herself obliged to overcome.
``Perhaps,'' he said, after thinking it over for some time, ``she
went to a big common shop dressed as if she were an ordinary
woman and bought the socks and pretended she was going to carry
them home herself. She would do that so that she could take them
into some corner and slip the money in. Then, as she wanted to
have them sent from the shop, perhaps she bought some other
things and asked the people to deliver the packages to different
places. The socks were sent to us and the other things to some
one else. She would go to a shop where no one knew her and no
one would expect to see her and she would wear clothes which
looked neither rich nor too poor.''
He created the whole episode with all its details and explained
them to Marco. It fascinated him for the entire evening and he
felt relieved after it and slept well.
Even before they had left London, certain newspapers had swept
out of existence the story of the descendant of the Lost Prince.
This had been done by derision and light handling--by treating it
as a romantic legend.
At first, The Rat had resented this bitterly, but one day at a
meal, when he had been producing arguments to prove that the
story must be a true one, Loristan somehow checked him by his own
silence.
``If there is such a man,'' he said after a pause, ``it is well
for him that his existence should not be believed in--for some
time at least.''
The Rat came to a dead stop. He felt hot for a moment and then
felt cold. He saw a new idea all at once. He had been making a
mistake in tactics.
No more was said but, when they were alone afterwards, he poured
himself forth to Marco.
``I was a fool!'' he cried out. ``Why couldn't I see it for
myself! Shall I tell you what I believe has been done? There is
some one who has influence in England and who is a friend to
Samavia. They've got the newspapers to make fun of the story so
that it won't be believed. If it was believed, both the
Iarovitch and the Maranovitch would be on the lookout, and the
Secret Party would lose their chances. What a fool I was not to
think of it! There's some one watching and working here who is a
friend to Samavia.''
``But there is some one in Samavia who has begun to suspect that
it might be true,'' Marco answered. ``If there were not, I
should not have been shut in the cellar. Some one thought my
father knew something. The spies had orders to find out what it
was.''
``Yes. Yes. That's true, too!'' The Rat answered anxiously.
``We shall have to be very careful.''
In the lining of the sleeve of Marco's coat there was a slit into
which he could slip any small thing he wished to conceal and also
wished to be able to reach without trouble. In this he had
carried the sketch of the lady which he had torn up in Paris.
When they walked in the streets of Munich, the morning after
their arrival, he carried still another sketch. It was the one
picturing the genial- looking old aristocrat with the sly smile.
One of the things they had learned about this one was that his
chief characteristic was his passion for music. He was a patron
of musicians and he spent much time in Munich because he loved
its musical atmosphere and the earnestness of its opera-goers.
``The military band plays in the Feldherrn-halle at midday. When
something very good is being played, sometimes people stop their
carriages so that they can listen. We will go there,'' said
Marco.
``It's a chance,'' said The Rat. ``We mustn't lose anything like
a chance.''
The day was brilliant and sunny, the people passing through the
streets looked comfortable and homely, the mixture of old streets
and modern ones, of ancient corners and shops and houses of the
day was picturesque and cheerful. The Rat swinging through the
crowd on his crutches was full of interest and exhilaration. He
had begun to grow, and the change in his face and expression
which had begun in London had become more noticeable. He had
been given his ``place,'' and a work to do which entitled him to
hold it.
No one could have suspected them of carrying a strange and vital
secret with them as they strolled along together. They seemed
only two ordinary boys who looked in at shop windows and talked
over their contents, and who loitered with upturned faces in the
Marien- Platz before the ornate Gothic Rathaus to hear the eleven
o'clock chimes play and see the painted figures of the King and
Queen watch from their balcony the passing before them of the
automatic tournament procession with its trumpeters and tilting
knights. When the show was over and the automatic cock broke
forth into his lusty farewell crow, they laughed just as any
other boys would have laughed. Sometimes it would have been easy
for The Rat to forget that there was anything graver in the world
than the new places and new wonders he was seeing, as if he were
a wandering minstrel in a story.
But in Samavia bloody battles were being fought, and bloody plans
were being wrought out, and in anguished anxiety the Secret Party
and the Forgers of the Sword waited breathlessly for the Sign for
which they had waited so long. And inside the lining of Marco's
coat was hidden the sketched face, as the two unnoticed lads made
their way to the Feldherrn-halle to hear the band play and see
who might chance to be among the audience.
Because the day was sunny, and also because the band was playing
a specially fine programme, the crowd in the square was larger
than usual. Several vehicles had stopped, and among them were
one or two which were not merely hired cabs but were the
carriages of private persons.
One of them had evidently arrived early, as it was drawn up in a
good position when the boys reached the corner. It was a big
open carriage and a grand one, luxuriously upholstered in green.
The footman and coachman wore green and silver liveries and
seemed to know that people were looking at them and their master.
He was a stout, genial-looking old aristocrat with a sly smile,
though, as he listened to the music, it almost forgot to be sly.
In the carriage with him were a young officer and a little boy,
and they also listened attentively. Standing near the carriage
door were several people who were plainly friends or
acquaintances, as they occasionally spoke to him. Marco touched
The Rat's coat sleeve as the two boys approached.
``It would not be easy to get near him,'' he said. ``Let us go
and stand as close to the carriage as we can get without pushing.
Perhaps we may hear some one say something about where he is
going after the music is over.''
Yes, there was no mistaking him. He was the right man. Each of
them knew by heart the creases on his stout face and the sweep of
his gray moustache. But there was nothing noticeable in a boy
looking for a moment at a piece of paper, and Marco sauntered a
few steps to a bit of space left bare by the crowd and took a
last glance at his sketch. His rule was to make sure at the
final moment. The music was very good and the group about the
carriage was evidently enthusiastic. There was talk and praise
and comment, and the old aristocrat nodded his head repeatedly in
applause.
``The Chancellor is music mad,'' a looker-on near the boys said
to another. ``At the opera every night unless serious affairs
keep him away! There you may see him nodding his old head and
bursting his gloves with applauding when a good thing is done.
He ought to have led an orchestra or played a 'cello. He is too
big for first violin.''
There was a group about the carriage to the last, when the music
came to an end and it drove away. There had been no possible
opportunity of passing close to it even had the presence of the
young officer and the boy not presented an insurmountable
obstacle.
Marco and The Rat went on their way and passed by the Hof-
Theater and read the bills. ``Tristan and Isolde'' was to be
presented at night and a great singer would sing Isolde.
``He will go to hear that,'' both boys said at once. ``He will
be sure to go.''
It was decided between them that Marco should go on his quest
alone when night came. One boy who hung around the entrance of
the Opera would be observed less than two.
``People notice crutches more than they notice legs,'' The Rat
said. ``I'd better keep out of the way unless you need me. My
time hasn't come yet. Even if it doesn't come at all I've--I've
been on duty. I've gone with you and I've been ready- that's what
an aide-de- camp does.''
He stayed at home and read such English papers as he could lay
hands on and he drew plans and re-fought battles on paper.
Marco went to the opera. Even if he had not known his way to the
square near the place where the Hof-Theater stood, he could
easily have found it by following the groups of people in the
streets who all seemed walking in one direction. There were
students in their odd caps walking three or four abreast, there
were young couples and older ones, and here and there whole
families; there were soldiers of all ages, officers and privates;
and, when talk was to be heard in passing, it was always talk
about music.
For some time Marco waited in the square and watched the
carriages roll up and pass under the huge pillared portico to
deposit their contents at the entrance and at once drive away in
orderly sequence. He must make sure that the grand carriage with
the green and silver liveries rolled up with the rest. If it
came, he would buy a cheap ticket and go inside.
It was rather late when it arrived. People in Munich are not
late for the opera if it can be helped, and the coachman drove up
hurriedly. The green and silver footman leaped to the ground and
opened the carriage door almost before it stopped. The
Chancellor got out looking less genial than usual because he was
afraid that he might lose some of the overture. A rosy-cheeked
girl in a white frock was with him and she was evidently trying
to soothe him.
``I do not think we are really late, Father,'' she said. ``Don't
feel cross, dear. It will spoil the music for you.''
This was not a time in which a man's attention could be attracted
quietly. Marco ran to get the ticket which would give him a
place among the rows of young soldiers, artists, male and female
students, and musicians who were willing to stand four or five
deep throughout the performance of even the longest opera. He
knew that, unless they were in one of the few boxes which
belonged only to the court, the Chancellor and his rosy-cheeked
daughter would be in the best seats in the front curve of the
balcony which were the most desirable of the house. He soon saw
them. They had secured the central places directly below the
large royal box where two quiet princesses and their attendants
were already seated.
When he found he was not too late to hear the overture, the
Chancellor's face become more genial than ever. He settled
himself down to an evening of enjoyment and evidently forgot
everything else in the world. Marco did not lose sight of him.
When the audience went out between acts to promenade in the
corridors, he might go also and there might be a chance to pass
near to him in the crowd. He watched him closely. Sometimes his
fine old face saddened at the beautiful woe of the music,
sometimes it looked enraptured, and it was always evident that
every note reached his soul.
The pretty daughter who sat beside him was attentive but not so
enthralled. After the first act two glittering young officers
appeared and made elegant and low bows, drawing their heels
together as they kissed her hand. They looked sorry when they
were obliged to return to their seats again.
After the second act the Chancellor sat for a few minutes as if
he were in a dream. The people in the seats near him began to
rise from their seats and file out into the corridors. The young
officers were to be seen rising also. The rosy daughter leaned
forward and touched her father's arm gently.
``She wants him to take her out,'' Marco thought. ``He will take
her because he is good-natured.''
He saw him recall himself from his dream with a smile and then he
rose and, after helping to arrange a silvery blue scarf round the
girl's shoulders, gave her his arm just as Marco skipped out of
his fourth-row standing-place.
It was a rather warm night and the corridors were full. By the
time Marco had reached the balcony floor, the pair had issued
from the little door and were temporarily lost in the moving
numbers.
Marco quietly made his way among the crowd trying to look as if
he belonged to somebody. Once or twice his strong body and his
dense black eyes and lashes made people glance at him, but he
was not the only boy who had been brought to the opera so he felt
safe enough to stop at the foot of the stairs and watch those who
went up and those who passed by. Such a miscellaneous crowd as
it was made up of--good unfashionable music-lovers mixed here and
there with grand people of the court and the gay world.
Suddenly he heard a low laugh and a moment later a hand lightly
touched him.
``You DID get out, then?'' a soft voice said.
When he turned he felt his muscles stiffen. He ceased to slouch
and did not smile as he looked at the speaker. What he felt was
a wave of fierce and haughty anger. It swept over him before he
had time to control it.
A lovely person who seemed swathed in several shades of soft
violet drapery was smiling at him with long, lovely eyes.
It was the woman who had trapped him into No. 10 Brandon Terrace.
XXI
``HELP!''
Did it take you so long to find it? asked the Lovely Person with
the smile. ``Of course I knew you would find it in the end. But
we had to give ourselves time. How long did it take?''
Marco removed himself from beneath the touch of her hand. It was
quietly done, but there was a disdain in his young face which
made her wince though she pretended to shrug her shoulders
amusedly.
``You refuse to answer?'' she laughed.
``I refuse.''
At that very moment he saw at the curve of the corridor the
Chancellor and his daughter approaching slowly. The two young
officers were talking gaily to the girl. They were on their way
back to their box. Was he going to lose them? Was he?
The delicate hand was laid on his shoulder again, but this time
he felt that it grasped him firmly.
``Naughty boy!'' the soft voice said. ``I am going to take you
home with me. If you struggle I shall tell these people that you
are my bad boy who is here without permission. What will you
answer? My escort is coming down the staircase and will help me.
Do you see?'' And in fact there appeared in the crowd at the
head of the staircase the figure of the man he remembered.
He did see. A dampness broke out on the palms of his hands. If
she did this bold thing, what could he say to those she told her
lie to? How could he bring proof or explain who he was--and what
story dare he tell? His protestations and struggles would merely
amuse the lookers-on, who would see in them only the impotent
rage of an insubordinate youngster.
There swept over him a wave of remembrance which brought back, as
if he were living through it again, the moment when he had stood
in the darkness of the wine cellar with his back against the door
and heard the man walk away and leave him alone. He felt again
as he had done then--but now he was in another land and far away
from his father. He could do nothing to help himself unless
Something showed him a way.
He made no sound, and the woman who held him saw only a flame
leap under his dense black lashes.
But something within him called out. It was as if he heard it.
It was that strong self--the self that was Marco, and it
called--it called as if it shouted.
``Help!'' it called--to that Unknown Stranger Thing which had
made worlds and which he and his father so often talked of and in
whose power they so believed. ``Help!''
The Chancellor was drawing nearer. Perhaps! Should he--?
``You are too proud to kick and shout,'' the voice went on.
``And people would only laugh. Do you see?''
The stairs were crowded and the man who was at the head of them
could only move slowly. But he had seen the boy.
Marco turned so that he could face his captor squarely as if he
were going to say something in answer to her. But he was not.
Even as he made the movement of turning, the help he had called
for came and he knew what he should do. And he could do two
things at once--save himself and give his Sign--because, the Sign
once given, the Chancellor would understand.
``He will be here in a moment. He has recognized you,'' the
woman said.
As he glanced up the stairs, the delicate grip of her hand
unconsciously slackened.
Marco whirled away from her. The bell rang which was to warn the
audience that they must return to their seats and he saw the
Chancellor hasten his pace.
A moment later, the old aristocrat found himself amazedly looking
down at the pale face of a breathless lad who spoke to him in
German and in such a manner that he could not but pause and
listen .
``Sir,'' he was saying, ``the woman in violet at the foot of the
stairs is a spy. She trapped me once and she threatens to do it
again. Sir, may I beg you to protect me?''
He said it low and fast. No one else could hear his words.
``What! What!'' the Chancellor exclaimed.
And then, drawing a step nearer and quite as low and rapidly but
with perfect distinctness, Marco uttered four words:
``The Lamp is lighted.''
The Help cry had been answered instantly. Marco saw it at once
in the old man's eyes, notwithstanding that he turned to look at
the woman at the foot of the staircase as if she only concerned
him.
``What! What!'' he said again, and made a movement toward her,
pulling his large moustache with a fierce hand.
Then Marco recognized that a curious thing happened. The Lovely
Person saw the movement and the gray moustache, and that instant
her smile died away and she turned quite white--so white, that
under the brilliant electric light she was almost green and
scarcely looked lovely at all. She made a sign to the man on the
staircase and slipped through the crowd like an eel. She was a
slim flexible creature and never was a disappearance more
wonderful in its rapidity. Between stout matrons and their thin
or stout escorts and families she made her way and lost
herself--but always making toward the exit. In two minutes there
was no sight of her violet draperies to be seen. She was gone
and so, evidently, was her male companion.
It was plain to Marco that to follow the profession of a spy was
not by any means a safe thing. The Chancellor had recognized
her-- she had recognized the Chancellor who turned looking
ferociously angry and spoke to one of the young officers.
``She and the man with her are two of the most dangerous spies in
Europe, She is a Rumanian and he is a Russian. What they wanted
of this innocent lad I don't pretend to know. What did she
threaten?'' to Marco.
Marco was feeling rather cold and sick and had lost his healthy
color for the moment.
``She said she meant to take me home with her and would pretend I
was her son who had come here without permission,'' he answered.
``She believes I know something I do not.'' He made a hesitating
but grateful bow. ``The third act, sir--I must not keep you.
Thank you! Thank you!''
The Chancellor moved toward the entrance door of the balcony
seats, but he did it with his hand on Marco's shoulder.
``See that he gets home safely,'' he said to the younger of the
two officers. ``Send a messenger with him. He's young to be
attacked by creatures of that kind.''
Polite young officers naturally obey the commands of Chancellors
and such dignitaries. This one found without trouble a young
private who marched with Marco through the deserted streets to
his lodgings. He was a stolid young Bavarian peasant and seemed
to have no curiosity or even any interest in the reason for the
command given him. He was in fact thinking of his sweetheart who
lived near Konigsee and who had skated with him on the frozen
lake last winter. He scarcely gave a glance to the schoolboy he
was to escort, he neither knew nor wondered why.
The Rat had fallen asleep over his papers and lay with his head
on his folded arms on the table. But he was awakened by Marco's
coming into the room and sat up blinking his eyes in the effort
to get them open.
``Did you see him? Did you get near enough?'' he drowsed.
``Yes,'' Marco answered. ``I got near enough.'
The Rat sat upright suddenly.
``It's not been easy,'' he exclaimed. ``I'm sure something
happened --something went wrong.''
``Something nearly went wrong--VERY nearly,'' answered Marco.
But as he spoke he took the sketch of the Chancellor out of the
slit in his sleeve and tore it and burned it with a match. ``But
I did get near enough. And that's TWO.''
They talked long, before they went to sleep that night. The Rat
grew pale as he listened to the story of the woman in violet.
``I ought to have gone with you!'' he said. ``I see now. An
aide- de-camp must always be in attendance. It would have been
harder for her to manage two than one. I must always be near to
watch, even if I am not close by you. If you had not come
back--if you had not come back!'' He struck his clenched hands
together fiercely. ``What should I have done!''
When Marco turned toward him from the table near which he was
standing, he looked like his father.
``You would have gone on with the Game just as far as you
could,'' he said. ``You could not leave it. You remember the
places, and the faces, and the Sign. There is some money; and
when it was all gone, you could have begged, as we used to
pretend we should.
We have not had to do it yet; and it was best to save it for
country places and villages. But you could have done it if you
were obliged to. The Game would have to go on.''
The Rat caught at his thin chest as if he had been struck
breathless.
``Without you?'' he gasped. ``Without you?''
``Yes,'' said Marco. ``And we must think of it, and plan in case
anything like that should happen.''
He stopped himself quite suddenly, and sat down, looking straight
before him, as if at some far away thing he saw.
``Nothing will happen,'' he said. ``Nothing can.''
``What are you thinking of?'' The Rat gulped, because his breath
had not quite come back. ``Why will nothing happen?''
``Because--'' the boy spoke in an almost matter-of-fact tone--in
quite an unexalted tone at all events, ``you see I can always
make a strong call, as I did tonight.''
``Did you shout?'' The Rat asked. ``I didn't know you shouted.''
``I didn't. I said nothing aloud. But I--the myself that is in
me,'' Marco touched himself on the breast, ``called out, `Help!
Help!' with all its strength. And help came.''
The Rat regarded him dubiously.
``What did it call to?'' he asked.
``To the Power--to the Strength-place--to the Thought that does
things. The Buddhist hermit, who told my father about it, called
it `The Thought that thought the World.' ''
A reluctant suspicion betrayed itself in The Rat's eyes.
``Do you mean you prayed?'' he inquired, with a slight touch of
disfavor.
Marco's eyes remained fixed upon him in vague thoughtfulness for
a moment or so of pause.
``I don't know,'' he said at last. ``Perhaps it's the same
thing-- when you need something so much that you cry out loud for
it. But it's not words, it's a strong thing without a name. I
called like that when I was shut in the wine-cellar. I
remembered some of the things the old Buddhist told my father.''
The Rat moved restlessly.
``The help came that time,'' he admitted. ``How did it come tonight?''
``In that thought which flashed into my mind almost the next
second. It came like lightning. All at once I knew if I ran to
the Chancellor and said the woman was a spy, it would startle him
into listening to me; and that then I could give him the Sign;
and that when I gave him the Sign, he would know I was speaking
the truth and would protect me.''
``It was a splendid thought!'' The Rat said. ``And it was quick.
But it was you who thought of it.''
``All thinking is part of the Big Thought,'' said Marco slowly.
``It KNOWS--It KNOWS. And the outside part of us somehow broke
the chain that linked us to It. And we are always trying to mend
the chain, without knowing it. That is what our thinking
is--trying to mend the chain. But we shall find out how to do it
sometime. The old Buddhist told my father so--just as the sun
was rising from behind a high peak of the Himalayas.'' Then he
added hastily, ``I am only telling you what my father told me,
and he only told me what the old hermit told him.''
``Does your father believe what he told him?'' The Rat's
bewilderment had become an eager and restless thing.
``Yes, he believes it. He always thought something like it,
himself. That is why he is so calm and knows so well how to
wait.''
``Is THAT it!'' breathed The Rat. ``Is that why? Has--has he
mended the chain?'' And there was awe in his voice, because of
this one man to whom he felt any achievement was possible.
``I believe he has,'' said Marco. ``Don't you think so
yourself?''
``He has done something,'' The Rat said.
He seemed to be thinking things over before he spoke again-- and
then even more slowly than Marco.
``If he could mend the chain,'' he said almost in a whisper, ``he
could find out where the descendant of the Lost Prince is. He
would know what to do for Samavia!''
He ended the words with a start, and his whole face glowed with a
new, amazed light.
``Perhaps he does know!'' he cried. ``If the help comes like
thoughts --as yours did--perhaps his thought of letting us give
the Sign was part of it. We--just we two every-day boys--are
part of it!''
``The old Buddhist said--'' began Marco.
``Look here!'' broke in The Rat. ``Tell me the whole story. I
want to hear it.''
It was because Loristan had heard it, and listened and believed,
that The Rat had taken fire. His imagination seized upon the
idea, as it would have seized on some theory of necromancy proved
true and workable.
With his elbows on the table and his hands in his hair, he leaned
forward, twisting a lock with restless fingers. His breath
quickened.
``Tell it,'' he said, ``I want to hear it all!''
``I shall have to tell it in my own words,'' Marco said. ``And
it won't be as wonderful as it was when my father told it to me.
This is what I remember:
``My father had gone through much pain and trouble. A great load
was upon him, and he had been told he was going to die before his
work was done. He had gone to India, because a man he was
obliged to speak to had gone there to hunt, and no one knew when
he would return. My father followed him for months from one wild
place to another, and, when he found him, the man would not hear
or believe what he had come so far to say. Then he had
jungle-fever and almost died. Once the natives left him for dead
in a bungalow in the forest, and he heard the jackals howling
round him all the night. Through all the hours he was only alive
enough to be conscious of two things--all the rest of him seemed
gone from his body: his thought knew that his work was
unfinished--and his body heard the jackals howl!''
``Was the work for Samavia?'' The Rat put in quickly. ``If he
had died that night, the descendant of the Lost Prince never
would have been found--never!'' The Rat bit his lip so hard that
a drop of blood started from it.
``When he was slowly coming alive again, a native, who had gone
back and stayed to wait upon him, told him that near the summit
of a mountain, about fifty miles away, there was a ledge which
jutted out into space and hung over the valley, which was
thousands of feet below. On the ledge there was a hut in which
there lived an ancient Buddhist, who was a holy man, as they
called him, and who had been there during time which had not
been measured. They said that their grandparents and
great-grandparents had known of him, though very few persons had
ever seen him. It was told that the most savage beast was tame
before him. They said that a man- eating tiger would stop to
salute him, and that a thirsty lioness would bring her whelps to
drink at the spring near his hut.''
``That was a lie,'' said The Rat promptly.
Marco neither laughed nor frowned.
``How do we KNOW?'' he said. ``It was a native's story, and it
might be anything. My father neither said it was true nor false.
He listened to all that was told him by natives. They said that
the holy man was the brother of the stars. He knew all things
past and to come, and could heal the sick. But most people,
especially those who had sinful thoughts, were afraid to go near
him.''
``I'd like to have seen--'' The Rat pondered aloud, but he did
not finish.
``Before my father was well, he had made up his mind to travel to
the ledge if he could. He felt as if he must go. He thought
that if he were going to die, the hermit might tell him some wise
thing to do for Samavia.''
``He might have given him a message to leave to the Secret
Ones,'' said The Rat.
``He was so weak when he set out on his journey that he wondered
if he would reach the end of it. Part of the way he traveled by
bullock cart, and part, he was carried by natives. But at last
the bearers came to a place more than halfway up the mountain,
and would go no further. Then they went back and left him to
climb the rest of the way himself. They had traveled slowly and
he had got more strength, but he was weak yet. The forest was
more wonderful than anything he had ever seen. There were
tropical trees with foliage like lace, and some with huge leaves,
and some of them seemed to reach the sky. Sometimes he could
barely see gleams of blue through them. And vines swung down
from their high branches, and caught each other, and matted
together; and there were hot scents, and strange flowers, and
dazzling birds darting about, and thick moss, and little
cascades bursting out. The path grew narrower and steeper, and
the flower scents and the sultriness made it like walking in a
hothouse. He heard rustlings in the undergrowth, which might
have been made by any kind of wild animal; once he stepped across
a deadly snake without seeing it. But it was asleep and did not
hurt him. He knew the natives had been convinced that he would
not reach the ledge; but for some strange reason he believed he
should. He stopped and rested many times, and he drank some milk
he had brought in a canteen. The higher he climbed, the more
wonderful everything was, and a strange feeling began to fill
him. He said his body stopped being tired and began to feel very
light. And his load lifted itself from his heart, as if it were
not his load any more but belonged to something stronger. Even
Samavia seemed to be safe. As he went higher and higher, and
looked down the abyss at the world below, it appeared as if it
were not real but only a dream he had wakened from--only a
dream.''
The Rat moved restlessly.
``Perhaps he was light-headed with the fever,'' he suggested.
``The fever had left him, and the weakness had left him,'' Marco
answered. ``It seemed as if he had never really been ill at
all-- as if no one could be ill, because things like that were
only dreams, just as the world was.''
``I wish I'd been with him! Perhaps I could have thrown these
away--down into the abyss!'' And The Rat shook his crutches
which rested against the table. ``I feel as if I was climbing,
too. Go on.''
Marco had become more absorbed than The Rat. He had lost himself
in the memory of the story.
``I felt that _I_ was climbing, when he told me,'' he said. ``I
felt as if I were breathing in the hot flower-scents and pushing
aside the big leaves and giant ferns. There had been a rain, and
they were wet and shining with big drops, like jewels, that
showered over him as he thrust his way through and under them.
And the stillness and the height--the stillness and the height!
I can't make it real to you as he made it to me! I can't! I was
there. He took me. And it was so high--and so still--and so
beautiful that I could scarcely bear it.''
But the truth was, that with some vivid boy-touch he had carried
his hearer far. The Rat was deadly quiet. Even his eyes had not
moved. He spoke almost as if he were in a sort of trance.
``It's real,'' he said. ``I'm there now. As high as you--go
on--go on. I want to climb higher.''
And Marco, understanding, went on.
``The day was over and the stars were out when he reached the
place were the ledge was. He said he thought that during the
last part of the climb he never looked on the earth at all. The
stars were so immense that he could not look away from them.
They seemed to be drawing him up. And all overhead was like
violet velvet, and they hung there like great lamps of radiance.
Can you see them? You must see them. My father saw them all
night long. They were part of the wonder.''
``I see them,'' The Rat answered, still in his trance-like voice
and without stirring, and Marco knew he did.
``And there, with the huge stars watching it, was the hut on the
ledge. And there was no one there. The door was open. And
outside it was a low bench and table of stone. And on the table
was a meal of dates and rice, waiting. Not far from the hut was
a deep spring, which ran away in a clear brook. My father drank
and bathed his face there. Then he went out on the ledge, and
sat down and waited, with his face turned up to the stars. He
did not lie down, and he thought he saw the stars all the time he
waited. He was sure he did not sleep. He did not know how long
he sat there alone. But at last he drew his eyes from the stars,
as if he had been commanded to do it. And he was not alone any
more. A yard or so away from him sat the holy man. He knew it
was the hermit because his eyes were different from any human
eyes he had ever beheld. They were as still as the night was,
and as deep as the shadows covering the world thousands of feet
below, and they had a far, far look, and a strange light was in
them.''
``What did he say?'' asked The Rat hoarsely.
``He only said, `Rise, my son. I awaited thee. Go and eat the
food I prepared for thee, and then we will speak together.' He
didn't move or speak again until my father had eaten the meal.
He only sat on the moss and let his eyes rest on the shadows over
the abyss. When my father went back, he made a gesture which
meant that he should sit near him.
``Then he sat still for several minutes, and let his eyes rest on
my father, until he felt as if the light in them were set in the
midst of his own body and his soul. Then he said, `I cannot tell
thee all thou wouldst know. That I may not do.' He had a
wonderful gentle voice, like a deep soft bell. `But the work
will be done. Thy life and thy son's life will set it on its
way.'
``They sat through the whole night together. And the stars hung
quite near, as if they listened. And there were sounds in the
bushes of stealthy, padding feet which wandered about as if the
owners of them listened too. And the wonderful, low, peaceful
voice of the holy man went on and on, telling of wonders which
seemed like miracles but which were to him only the `working of
the Law.' ''
``What is the Law?'' The Rat broke in.
``There were two my father wrote down, and I learned them. The
first was the law of The One. I'll try to say that,'' and he
covered his eyes and waited through a moment of silence.
It seemed to The Rat as if the room held an extraordinary
stillness.
``Listen!'' came next. ``This is it:
`` `There are a myriad worlds. There is but One Thought out of
which they grew. Its Law is Order which cannot swerve. Its
creatures are free to choose. Only they can create Disorder,
which in itself is Pain and Woe and Hate and Fear. These they
alone can bring forth. The Great One is a Golden Light. It is
not remote but near. Hold thyself within its glow and thou wilt
behold all things clearly. First, with all thy breathing being,
know one thing! That thine own thought--when so thou
standest--is one with That which thought the Worlds!' ''
``What?'' gasped The Rat. ``MY thought--the things _I_ think!''
``Your thoughts--boys' thoughts--anybody's thoughts.''
``You're giving me the jim-jams!''
``He said it,'' answered Marco. ``And it was then he spoke about
the broken Link--and about the greatest books in the world--that
in all their different ways, they were only saying over and over
again one thing thousands of times. Just this thing--`Hate not,
Fear not, Love.' And he said that was Order. And when it was
disturbed, suffering came--poverty and misery and catastrophe and
wars.''
``Wars!'' The Rat said sharply. ``The World couldn't do without
war--and armies and defences! What about Samavia?''
``My father asked him that. And this is what he answered. I
learned that too. Let me think again,'' and he waited as he had
waited before. Then he lifted his head. ``Listen! This is it:
`` `Out of the blackness of Disorder and its outpouring of human
misery, there will arise the Order which is Peace. When Man
learns that he is one with the Thought which itself creates all
beauty, all power, all splendor, and all repose, he will not fear
that his brother can rob him of his heart's desire. He will
stand in the Light and draw to himself his own.' ''
``Draw to himself?'' The Rat said. ``Draw what he wants? I
don't believe it!''
``Nobody does,'' said Marco. ``We don't know. He said we stood
in the dark of the night--without stars--and did not know that
the broken chain swung just above us.''
``I don't believe it!'' said The Rat. ``It's too big!''
Marco did not say whether he believed it or not. He only went on
speaking.
``My father listened until he felt as if he had stopped
breathing. Just at the stillest of the stillness the Buddhist
stopped speaking. And there was a rustling of the undergrowth a
few yards away, as if something big was pushing its way
through--and there was the soft pad of feet. The Buddhist turned
his head and my father heard him say softly: `Come forth,
Sister.'
``And a huge leopardess with two cubs walked out on to the ledge
and came to him and threw herself down with a heavy lunge near
his feet.''
``Your father saw that!'' cried out The Rat. ``You mean the old
fellow knew something that made wild beasts afraid to touch him
or any one near him?''
``Not afraid. They knew he was their brother, and that he was
one with the Law. He had lived so long with the Great Thought
that all darkness and fear had left him forever. He had mended
the Chain.''
The Rat had reached deep waters. He leaned forward--his hands
burrowing in his hair, his face scowling and twisted, his eyes
boring into space. He had climbed to the ledge at the
mountain-top; he had seen the luminous immensity of the stars,
and he had looked down into the shadows filling the world
thousands of feet below. Was there some remote deep in him from
whose darkness a slow light was rising? All that Loristan had
said he knew must be true. But the rest of it--?
Marco got up and came over to him. He looked like his father
again.
``If the descendant of the Lost Prince is brought back to rule
Samavia, he will teach his people the Law of the One. It was for
that the holy man taught my father until the dawn came.''
``Who will--who will teach the Lost Prince--the new King--when he
is found?'' The Rat cried. ``Who will teach him?''
``The hermit said my father would. He said he would also teach
his son--and that son would teach his son--and he would teach
his. And through such as they were, the whole world would come
to know the Order and the Law.''
Never had The Rat looked so strange and fierce a thing. A whole
world at peace! No tactics--no battles--no slaughtered heroes
--no clash of arms, and fame! It made him feel sick. And yet--
something set his chest heaving.
``And your father would teach him that--when he was found! So
that he could teach his sons. Your father BELIEVES in it?''
``Yes,'' Marco answered. He said nothing but ``Yes.'' The Rat
threw himself forward on the table, face downward.
``Then,'' he said, ``he must make me believe it. He must teach
me--if he can.''
They heard a clumping step upon the staircase, and, when it
reached the landing, it stopped at their door. Then there was a
solid knock.
When Marco opened the door, the young soldier who had escorted
him from the Hof-Theater was standing outside. He looked as
uninterested and stolid as before, as he handed in a small flat
package.
``You must have dropped it near your seat at the Opera,'' he
said. ``I was to give it into your own hands. It is your
purse.''
After he had clumped down the staircase again, Marco and The Rat
drew a quick breath at one and the same time.
``I had no seat and I had no purse,'' Marco said. ``Let us open
it.''
There was a flat limp leather note-holder inside. In it was a
paper, at the head of which were photographs of the Lovely Person
and her companion. Beneath were a few lines which stated that
they were the well known spies, Eugenia Karovna and Paul Varel,
and that the bearer must be protected against them. It was
signed by the Chief of the Police. On a separate sheet was
written the command: ``Carry this with you as protection.''
``That is help,'' The Rat said. ``It would protect us, even in
another country. The Chancellor sent it--but you made the strong
call --and it's here!''
There was no street lamp to shine into their windows when they
went at last to bed. When the blind was drawn up, they were
nearer the sky than they had been in the Marylebone Road. The
last thing each of them saw, as he went to sleep, was the
stars--and in their dreams, they saw them grow larger and larger,
and hang like lamps of radiance against the violet--velvet sky
above a ledge of a Himalayan Mountain, where they listened to the
sound of a low voice going on and on and on.
XXII
A NIGHT VIGIL
On a hill in the midst of a great Austrian plain, around which
high Alps wait watching through the ages stands a venerable
fortress, almost more beautiful than anything one has ever seen.
Perhaps, if it were not for the great plain flowering broadly
about it with its wide-spread beauties of meadow-land, and wood,
and dim toned buildings gathered about farms, and its dream of a
small ancient city at its feet, it might--though it is to be
doubted--seem something less a marvel of medieval
picturesqueness. But out of the plain rises the low hill, and
surrounding it at a stately distance stands guard the giant
majesty of Alps, with shoulders in the clouds and god-like heads
above them, looking on--always looking on--sometimes themselves
ethereal clouds of snow-whiteness, some times monster bare crags
which pierce the blue, and whose unchanging silence seems to know
the secret of the everlasting. And on the hill which this august
circle holds in its embrace, as though it enclosed a treasure,
stands the old, old, towered fortress built as a citadel for the
Prince Archbishops, who were kings in their domain in the long
past centuries when the splendor and power of ecclesiastical
princes was among the greatest upon earth.
And as you approach the town--and as you leave it--and as you
walk through its streets, the broad calm empty-looking ones, or
the narrow thoroughfares whose houses seem so near to each other,
whether you climb or descend--or cross bridges, or gaze at
churches, or step out on your balcony at night to look at the
mountains and the moon--always it seems that from some point you
can see it gazing down at you--the citadel of Hohen-Salzburg.
It was to Salzburg they went next, because at Salzburg was to be
found the man who looked like a hair-dresser and who worked in a
barber's shop. Strange as it might seem, to him also must be
carried the Sign.
``There may be people who come to him to be shaved--soldiers, or
men who know things,'' The Rat worked it out, ``and he can speak
to them when he is standing close to them. It will be easy to
get near him. You can go and have your hair cut.''
The journey from Munich was not a long one, and during the latter
part of it they had the wooden-seated third-class carriage to
themselves. Even the drowsy old peasant who nodded and slept in
one corner got out with his bundles at last. To Marco the
mountains were long-known wonders which could never grow old.
They had always and always been so old! Surely they had been the
first of the world! Surely they had been standing there waiting
when it was said ``Let there be Light.'' The Light had known it
would find them there. They were so silent, and yet it seemed as
if they said some amazing thing--something which would take your
breath from you if you could hear it. And they never changed.
The clouds changed, they wreathed them, and hid them, and trailed
down them, and poured out storm torrents on them, and thundered
against them, and darted forked lightnings round them. But the
mountains stood there afterwards as if such things had not been
and were not in the world. Winds roared and tore at them,
centuries passed over them--centuries of millions of lives, of
changing of kingdoms and empires, of battles and world-wide fame
which grew and died and passed away; and temples crumbled, and
kings' tombs were forgotten, and cities were buried and others
built over them after hundreds of years--and perhaps a few stones
fell from a mountain side, or a fissure was worn, which the
people below could not even see. And that was all. There they
stood, and perhaps their secret was that they had been there for
ever and ever. That was what the mountains said to Marco, which
was why he did not want to talk much, but sat and gazed out of
the carriage window.
The Rat had been very silent all the morning. He had been silent
when they got up, and he had scarcely spoken when they made their
way to the station at Munich and sat waiting for their train. It
seemed to Marco that he was thinking so hard that he was like a
person who was far away from the place he stood in. His brows
were drawn together and his eyes did not seem to see the people
who passed by. Usually he saw everything and made shrewd remarks
on almost all he saw. But to-day he was somehow otherwise
absorbed. He sat in the train with his forehead against the
window and stared out. He moved and gasped when he found himself
staring at the Alps, but afterwards he was even strangely still.
It was not until after the sleepy old peasant had gathered his
bundles and got out at a station that he spoke, and he did it
without turning his head.
``You only told me one of the two laws,'' he said. ``What was
the other one?''
Marco brought himself back from his dream of reaching the highest
mountain-top and seeing clouds float beneath his feet in the sun.
He had to come back a long way.
``Are you thinking of that? I wondered what you had been
thinking of all the morning,'' he said.
``I couldn't stop thinking of it. What was the second one?''
said The Rat, but he did not turn his head.
``It was called the Law of Earthly Living. It was for every
day,'' said Marco. ``It was for the ordering of common
things--the small things we think don't matter, as well as the
big ones. I always remember that one without any trouble. This
was it:
`` `Let pass through thy mind, my son, only the image thou
wouldst desire to see become a truth. Meditate only upon the
wish of thy heart--seeing first that it is such as can wrong no
man and is not ignoble. Then will it take earthly form and draw
near to thee.
`` `This is the Law of That which Creates.' ''
Then The Rat turned round. He had a shrewdly reasoning mind.
``That sounds as if you could get anything you wanted, if you
think about it long enough and in the right way,'' he said.
``But perhaps it only means that, if you do it, you'll be happy
after you're dead. My father used to shout with laughing when he
was drunk and talked about things like that and looked at his
rags.''
He hugged his knees for a few minutes. He was remembering the
rags, and the fog-darkened room in the slums, and the loud,
hideous laughter.
``What if you want something that will harm somebody else?'' he
said next. ``What if you hate some one and wish you could kill
him?''
``That was one of the questions my father asked that night on the
ledge. The holy man said people always asked it,'' Marco
answered. ``This was the answer:
`` `Let him who stretcheth forth his hand to draw the lightning
to his brother recall that through his own soul and body will
pass the bolt.' ''
``Wonder if there's anything in it?'' The Rat pondered. ``It'd
make a chap careful if he believed it! Revenging yourself on a
man would be like holding him against a live wire to kill him and
getting all the volts through yourself.''
A sudden anxiety revealed itself in his face.
``Does your father believe it?'' he asked. ``Does he?''
``He knows it is true,'' Marco said.
``I'll own up,'' The Rat decided after further reflection--``I'll
own up I'm glad that there isn't any one left that I've a grudge
against. There isn't any one--now.''
Then he fell again into silence and did not speak until their
journey was at an end. As they arrived early in the day, they
had plenty of time to wander about the marvelous little old city.
But through the wide streets and through the narrow ones, under
the archways into the market gardens, across the bridge and into
the square where the ``glockenspiel'' played its old tinkling
tune, everywhere the Citadel looked down and always The Rat
walked on in his dream.
They found the hair-dresser's shop in one of the narrow streets.
There were no grand shops there, and this particular shop was a
modest one. They walked past it once, and then went back. It
was a shop so humble that there was nothing remarkable in two
common boys going into it to have their hair cut. An old man
came forward to receive them. He was evidently glad of their
modest patronage. He undertook to attend to The Rat himself,
but, having arranged him in a chair, he turned about and called
to some one in the back room.
``Heinrich,'' he said.
In the slit in Marco's sleeve was the sketch of the man with
smooth curled hair, who looked like a hair-dresser. They had
found a corner in which to take their final look at it before
they turned back to come in. Heinrich, who came forth from the
small back room, had smooth curled hair. He looked extremely
like a hair- dresser. He had features like those in the
sketch--his nose and mouth and chin and figure were like what
Marco had drawn and committed to memory. But--
He gave Marco a chair and tied the professional white covering
around his neck. Marco leaned back and closed his eyes a moment.
``That is NOT the man!'' he was saying to himself. ``He is NOT
the man.''
How he knew he was not, he could not have explained, but he felt
sure. It was a strong conviction. But for the sudden feeling,
nothing would have been easier than to give the Sign. And if he
could not give it now, where was the one to whom it must be
spoken, and what would be the result if that one could not be
found? And if there were two who were so much alike, how could
he be sure?
Each owner of each of the pictured faces was a link in a powerful
secret chain; and if a link were missed, the chain would be
broken. Each time Heinrich came within the line of his vision,
he recorded every feature afresh and compared it with the
remembered sketch. Each time the resemblance became more close,
but each time some persistent inner conviction repeated, ``No;
the Sign is not for him!''
It was disturbing, also, to find that The Rat was all at once as
restless as he had previously been silent and preoccupied. He
moved in his chair, to the great discomfort of the old
hair-dresser. He kept turning his head to talk. He asked Marco
to translate divers questions he wished him to ask the two men.
They were questions about the Citadel--about the Monchsberg--the
Residenz--the Glockenspiel--the mountains. He added one query to
another and could not sit still.
``The young gentleman will get an ear snipped,'' said the old man
to Marco. ``And it will not be my fault.''
``What shall I do?'' Marco was thinking. ``He is not the man.''
He did not give the Sign. He must go away and think it out,
though where his thoughts would lead him he did not know. This
was a more difficult problem than he had ever dreamed of facing.
There was no one to ask advice of. Only himself and The Rat, who
was nervously wriggling and twisting in his chair.
``You must sit still,'' he said to him. ``The hair-dresser is
afraid you will make him cut you by accident.''
``But I want to know who lives at the Residenz?'' said The Rat.
``These men can tell us things if you ask them.''
``It is done now,'' said the old hair-dresser with a relieved
air. ``Perhaps the cutting of his hair makes the young gentleman
nervous. It is sometimes so.''
The Rat stood close to Marco's chair and asked questions until
Heinrich also had done his work. Marco could not understand his
companion's change of mood. He realized that, if he had wished
to give the Sign, he had been allowed no opportunity. He could
not have given it. The restless questioning had so directed the
older man's attention to his son and Marco that nothing could
have been said to Heinrich without his observing it.
``I could not have spoken if he had been the man,'' Marco said to
himself.
Their very exit from the shop seemed a little hurried. When they
were fairly in the street, The Rat made a clutch at Marco's arm.
``You didn't give it?'' he whispered breathlessly. ``I kept
talking and talking to prevent you.''
Marco tried not to feel breathless, and he tried to speak in a
low and level voice with no hint of exclamation in it.
``Why did you say that?'' he asked.
The Rat drew closer to him.
``That was not the man!'' he whispered. ``It doesn't matter how
much he looks like him, he isn't the right one.''
He was pale and swinging along swiftly as if he were in a hurry.
``Let's get into a quiet place,'' he said. ``Those queer things
you've been telling me have got hold of me. How did I know? How
could I know--unless it's because I've been trying to work that
second law? I've been saying to myself that we should be told
the right things to do--for the Game and for your father-- and so
that I could be the right sort of aide-de-camp. I've been
working at it, and, when he came out, I knew he was not the man
in spite of his looks. And I couldn't be sure you knew, and I
thought, if I kept on talking and interrupting you with silly
questions, you could be prevented from speaking.''
``There's a place not far away where we can get a look at the
mountains. Let's go there and sit down,'' said Marco. ``I knew
it was not the right one, too. It's the Help over again.''
``Yes, it's the Help--it's the Help--it must be,'' muttered The
Rat, walking fast and with a pale, set face. ``It could not be
anything else.''
They got away from the streets and the people and reached the
quiet place where they could see the mountains. There they sat
down by the wayside. The Rat took off his cap and wiped his
forehead, but it was not only the quick walking which had made it
damp.
``The queerness of it gave me a kind of fright,'' he said.
``When he came out and he was near enough for me to see him, a
sudden strong feeling came over me. It seemed as if I knew he
wasn't the man. Then I said to myself--`but he looks like
him'--and I began to get nervous. And then I was sure again--and
then I wanted to try to stop you from giving him the Sign. And
then it all seemed foolishness--and the next second all the
things you had told me rushed back to me at once--and I
remembered what I had been thinking ever since--and I
said--`Perhaps it's the Law beginning to work,' and the palms of
my hands got moist.''
Marco was very quiet. He was looking at the farthest and highest
peaks and wondering about many things.
``It was the expression of his face that was different,'' he
said. ``And his eyes. They are rather smaller than the right
man's are. The light in the shop was poor, and it was not until
the last time he bent over me that I found out what I had not
seen before. His eyes are gray--the other ones are brown.''
``Did you see that!'' The Rat exclaimed. ``Then we're sure!
We're safe!''
``We're not safe till we've found the right man,'' Marco said.
``Where is he? Where is he? Where is he?''
He said the words dreamily and quietly, as if he were lost in
thought--but also rather as if he expected an answer. And he
still looked at the far-off peaks. The Rat, after watching him a
moment or so, began to look at them also. They were like a
loadstone to him too. There was something stilling about them,
and when your eyes had rested upon them a few moments they did
not want to move away.
``There must be a ledge up there somewhere,'' he said at last.
``Let's go up and look for it and sit there and think and think--
about finding the right man.''
There seemed nothing fantastic in this to Marco. To go into some
quiet place and sit and think about the thing he wanted to
remember or to find out was an old way of his. To be quiet was
always the best thing, his father had taught him. It was like
listening to something which could speak without words.
``There is a little train which goes up the Gaisberg,'' he said.
``When you are at the top, a world of mountains spreads around
you. Lazarus went once and told me. And we can lie out on the
grass all night. Let us go, Aide-de-camp.''
So they went, each one thinking the same thought, and each
boy-mind holding its own vision. Marco was the calmer of the
two, because his belief that there was always help to be found
was an accustomed one and had ceased to seem to partake of the
supernatural. He believed quite simply that it was the working
of a law, not the breaking of one, which gave answer and led him
in his quests. The Rat, who had known nothing of laws other than
those administered by police-courts, was at once awed and
fascinated by the suggestion of crossing some borderland of the
Unknown. The law of the One had baffled and overthrown him, with
its sweeping away of the enmities of passions which created wars
and called for armies. But the Law of Earthly Living seemed to
offer practical benefits if you could hold on to yourself enough
to work it.
``You wouldn't get everything for nothing, as far as I can make
out,'' he had said to Marco. ``You'd have to sweep all the
rubbish out of your mind--sweep it as if you did it with a
broom--and then keep on thinking straight and believing you were
going to get things--and working for them--and they'd come.''
Then he had laughed a short ugly laugh because he recalled
something.
``There was something in the Bible that my father used to jeer
about--something about a man getting what he prayed for if he
believed it,'' he said.
``Oh, yes, it's there,'' said Marco. ``That if a man pray
believing he shall receive what he asks it shall be given him.
All the books say something like it. It's been said so often it
makes you believe it.''
``He didn't believe it, and I didn't,'' said The Rat.
``Nobody does--really,'' answered Marco, as he had done once
before. ``It's because we don't know.''
They went up the Gaisberg in the little train, which pushed and
dragged and panted slowly upward with them. It took them with it
stubbornly and gradually higher and higher until it had left
Salzburg and the Citadel below and had reached the world of
mountains which rose and spread and lifted great heads behind
each other and beside each other and beyond each other until
there seemed no other land on earth but that on mountain sides
and backs and shoulders and crowns. And also one felt the
absurdity of living upon flat ground, where life must be an
insignificant thing.
There were only a few sight-seers in the small carriages, and
they were going to look at the view from the summit. They were
not in search of a ledge.
The Rat and Marco were. When the little train stopped at the
top, they got out with the rest. They wandered about with them
over the short grass on the treeless summit and looked out from
this viewpoint and the other. The Rat grew more and more silent,
and his silence was not merely a matter of speechlessness but of
expression. He LOOKED silent and as if he were no longer aware
of the earth. They left the sight-seers at last and wandered
away by themselves. They found a ledge where they could sit or
lie and where even the world of mountains seemed below them.
They had brought some simple food with them, and they laid it
behind a jutting bit of rock. When the sight-seers boarded the
laboring little train again and were dragged back down the
mountain, their night of vigil would begin.
That was what it was to be. A night of stillness on the heights,
where they could wait and watch and hold themselves ready to hear
any thought which spoke to them.
The Rat was so thrilled that he would not have been surprised if
he had heard a voice from the place of the stars. But Marco only
believed that in this great stillness and beauty, if he held his
boy-soul quiet enough, he should find himself at last thinking of
something that would lead him to the place which held what it was
best that he should find. The people returned to the train and
it set out upon its way down the steepness.
They heard it laboring on its way, as though it was forced to
make as much effort to hold itself back as it had made to drag
itself upward.
Then they were alone, and it was a loneness such as an eagle
might feel when it held itself poised high in the curve of blue.
And they sat and watched. They saw the sun go down and, shade by
shade, deepen and make radiant and then draw away with it the
last touches of color--rose-gold, rose-purple, and rose-gray.
One mountain-top after another held its blush a few moments and
lost it. It took long to gather them all but at length they were
gone and the marvel of night fell.
The breath of the forests below was sweet about them, and
soundlessness enclosed them which was of unearthly peace. The
stars began to show themselves, and presently the two who waited
found their faces turned upward to the sky and they both were
speaking in whispers.
``The stars look large here,'' The Rat said.
``Yes,'' answered Marco. ``We are not as high as the Buddhist
was, but it seems like the top of the world.''
``There is a light on the side of the mountain yonder which is
not a star,'' The Rat whispered.
``It is a light in a hut where the guides take the climbers to
rest and to spend the night,'' answered Marco.
``It is so still,'' The Rat whispered again after a silence, and
Marco whispered back:
``It is so still.''
They had eaten their meal of black bread and cheese after the
setting of the sun, and now they lay down on their backs and
looked up until the first few stars had multiplied themselves
into myriads. They began a little low talk, but the
soundlessness was stronger than themselves.
``How am I going to hold on to that second law?'' The Rat said
restlessly. `` `Let pass through thy mind only the image thou
wouldst see become a truth.' The things that are passing through
my mind are not the things I want to come true. What if we don't
find him --don't find the right one, I mean!''
``Lie still--still--and look up at the stars,'' whispered Marco.
``They give you a SURE feeling.''
There was something in the curious serenity of him which calmed
even his aide-de-camp. The Rat lay still and looked--and
looked--and thought. And what he thought of was the desire of
his heart. The soundlessness enwrapped him and there was no
world left. That there was a spark of light in the
mountain-climbers' rest-hut was a thing forgotten.
They were only two boys, and they had begun their journey on the
earliest train and had been walking about all day and thinking of
great and anxious things.
``It is so still,'' The Rat whispered again at last.
``It is so still,'' whispered Marco.
And the mountains rising behind each other and beside each other
and beyond each other in the night, and also the myriads of stars
which had so multiplied themselves, looking down knew that they
were asleep--as sleep the human things which do not watch
forever.
``Some one is smoking,'' Marco found himself saying in a dream.
After which he awakened and found that the smoke was not part of
a dream at all. It came from the pipe of a young man who had an
alpenstock and who looked as if he had climbed to see the sun
rise. He wore the clothes of a climber and a green hat with a
tuft at the back. He looked down at the two boys, surprised.
``Good day,'' he said. ``Did you sleep here so that you could
see the sun get up?''
``Yes,'' answered Marco.
``Were you cold?''
``We slept too soundly to know. And we brought our thick
coats.''
``I slept half-way down the mountains,'' said the smoker. ``I am
a guide in these days, but I have not been one long enough to
miss a sunrise it is no work to reach. My father and brother
think I am mad about such things. They would rather stay in
their beds. Oh! he is awake, is he?'' turning toward The Rat,
who had risen on one elbow and was staring at him. ``What is the
matter? You look as if you were afraid of me.''
Marco did not wait for The Rat to recover his breath and speak.
``I know why he looks at you so,'' he answered for him. ``He is
startled. Yesterday we went to a hair-dresser's shop down below
there, and we saw a man who was almost exactly like you--only
--'' he added, looking up, ``his eyes were gray and yours are
brown.''
``He was my twin brother,'' said the guide, puffing at his pipe
cheerfully. ``My father thought he could make hair-dressers of
us both, and I tried it for four years. But I always wanted to
be climbing the mountains and there were not holidays enough. So
I cut my hair, and washed the pomade out of it, and broke away.
I don't look like a hair-dresser now, do I?''
He did not. Not at all. But Marco knew him. He was the man.
There was no one on the mountain-top but themselves, and the sun
was just showing a rim of gold above the farthest and highest
giant's shoulders. One need not be afraid to do anything, since
there was no one to see or hear. Marco slipped the sketch out of
the slit in his sleeve. He looked at it and he looked at the
guide, and then he showed it to him.
``That is not your brother. It is you!'' he said.
The man's face changed a little--more than any other face had
changed when its owner had been spoken to. On a mountain-top as
the sun rises one is not afraid.
``The Lamp is lighted,'' said Marco. ``The Lamp is lighted.''
``God be thanked!'' burst forth the man. And he took off his hat
and bared his head. Then the rim behind the mountain's shoulder
leaped forth into a golden torrent of splendor.
And The Rat stood up, resting his weight on his crutches in utter
silence, and stared and stared.
``That is three!'' said Marco.
XXIII
THE SILVER HORN
During the next week, which they spent in journeying towards
Vienna, they gave the Sign to three different persons at places
which were on the way. In a village across the frontier in
Bavaria they found a giant of an old man sitting on a bench under
a tree before his mountain ``Gasthaus'' or inn; and when the four
words were uttered, he stood up and bared his head as the guide
had done. When Marco gave the Sign in some quiet place to a man
who was alone, he noticed that they all did this and said their
``God be thanked'' devoutly, as if it were part of some religious
ceremony. In a small town a few miles away he had to search some
hours before he found a stalwart young shoemaker with bright
red hair and a horseshoe-shaped scar on his forehead. He was not
in his workshop when the boys first passed it, because, as they
found out later, he had been climbing a mountain the day before,
and had been detained in the descent because his companion had
hurt himself.
When Marco went in and asked him to measure him for a pair of
shoes, he was quite friendly and told them all about it.
``There are some good fellows who should not climb,'' he said.
``When they find themselves standing on a bit of rock jutting out
over emptiness, their heads begin to whirl round--and then, if
they don't turn head over heels a few thousand feet, it is
because some comrade is near enough to drag them back. There can
be no ceremony then and they sometimes get hurt--as my friend did
yesterday.''
``Did you never get hurt yourself?'' The Rat asked.
``When I was eight years old I did that,'' said the young
shoemaker, touching the scar on his forehead. ``But it was not
much. My father was a guide and took me with him. He wanted me
to begin early. There is nothing like it--climbing. I shall be
at it again. This won't do for me. I tried shoemaking because I
was in love with a girl who wanted me to stay at home. She
married another man. I am glad of it. Once a guide, always a
guide.'' He knelt down to measure Marco's foot, and Marco bent a
little forward.
``The Lamp is lighted,'' he said.
There was no one in the shop, but the door was open and people
were passing in the narrow street; so the shoemaker did not lift
his red head. He went on measuring.
``God be thanked!'' he said, in a low voice. ``Do you want these
shoes really, or did you only want me to take your measure?''
``I cannot wait until they are made,'' Marco answered. ``I must
go on.''
``Yes, you must go on,'' answered the shoemaker. ``But I'll tell
you what I'll do--I'll make them and keep them. Some great day
might come when I shall show them to people and swagger about
them.'' He glanced round cautiously, and then ended, still
bending over his measuring. ``They will be called the shoes of
the Bearer of the Sign. And I shall say, `He was only a lad.
This was the size of his foot.' '' Then he stood up with a great
smile.
``There'll be climbing enough to be done now,'' he said, ``and I
look to see you again somewhere.''
When the boys went away, they talked it over.
``The hair-dresser didn't want to be a hair-dresser, and the
shoemaker didn't want to make shoes,'' said The Rat. ``They both
wanted to be mountain-climbers. There are mountains in Samavia
and mountains on the way to it. You showed them to me on the
map.
``Yes; and secret messengers who can climb anywhere, and cross
dangerous places, and reconnoiter from points no one else can
reach, can find out things and give signals other men cannot,''
said Marco.
``That's what I thought out,'' The Rat answered. ``That was what
he meant when he said, `There will be climbing enough to be done
now.' ''
Strange were the places they went to and curiously unlike each
other were the people to whom they carried their message. The
most singular of all was an old woman who lived in so remote a
place that the road which wound round and round the mountain,
wound round it for miles and miles. It was not a bad road and it
was an amazing one to travel, dragged in a small cart by a mule,
when one could be dragged, and clambering slowly with rests
between when one could not: the tree-covered precipices one
looked down, the tossing whiteness of waterfalls, or the green
foaming of rushing streams, and the immensity of farm- and
village- scattered plains spreading themselves to the feet of
other mountains shutting them in were breath-taking beauties to
look down on, as the road mounted and wound round and round and
higher and higher.
``How can any one live higher than this?'' said The Rat as they
sat on the thick moss by the wayside after the mule and cart had
left them. ``Look at the bare crags looming up above there. Let
us look at her again. Her picture looked as if she were a
hundred years old.''
Marco took out his hidden sketch. It seemed surely one of the
strangest things in the world that a creature as old as this one
seemed could reach such a place, or, having reached it, could
ever descend to the world again to give aid to any person or
thing.
Her old face was crossed and recrossed with a thousand wrinkles.
Her profile was splendid yet and she had been a beauty in her
day. Her eyes were like an eagle's--and not an old eagle's. And
she had a long neck which held her old head high.
``How could she get here?'' exclaimed The Rat.
``Those who sent us know, though we don't,'' said Marco. ``Will
you sit here and rest while I go on further?''
``No!'' The Rat answered stubbornly. ``I didn't train myself to
stay behind. But we shall come to bare-rock climbing soon and
then I shall be obliged to stop,'' and he said the last bitterly.
He knew that, if Marco had come alone, he would have ridden in no
cart but would have trudged upward and onward sturdily to the end
of his journey.
But they did not reach the crags, as they had thought must be
inevitable. Suddenly half-way to the sky, as it seemed, they
came to a bend in the road and found themselves mounting into a
new green world--an astonishing marvel of a world, with green
velvet slopes and soft meadows and thick woodland, and cows
feeding in velvet pastures, and--as if it had been snowed down
from the huge bare mountain crags which still soared above into
heaven-- a mysterious, ancient, huddled village which, being thus
snowed down, might have caught among the rocks and rested there
through all time.
There it stood. There it huddled itself. And the monsters in
the blue above it themselves looked down upon it as if it were an
incredible thing--this ancient, steep-roofed, hanging-balconied,
crumbling cluster of human nests, which seemed a thousand miles
from the world. Marco and The Rat stood and stared at it. Then
they sat down and stared at it.
``How did it get here?'' The Rat cried.
Marco shook his head. He certainly could see no explanation of
its being there. Perhaps some of the oldest villages could tell
stories of how its first chalets had gathered themselves
together.
An old peasant driving a cow came down a steep path. He looked
with a dull curiosity at The Rat and his crutches; but when Marco
advanced and spoke to him in German, he did not seem to
understand, but shook his head saying something in a sort of
dialect Marco did not know.
``If they all speak like that, we shall have to make signs when
we want to ask anything,'' The Rat said. ``What will she
speak?''
``She will know the German for the Sign or we should not have
been sent here,'' answered Marco. ``Come on.''
They made their way to the village, which huddled itself together
evidently with the object of keeping itself warm when through the
winter months the snows strove to bury it and the winds roared
down from the huge mountain crags and tried to tear it from among
its rocks. The doors and windows were few and small, and
glimpses of the inside of the houses showed earthen floors and
dark rooms. It was plain that it was counted a more comfortable
thing to live without light than to let in the cold.
It was easy enough to reconnoiter. The few people they saw were
evidently not surprised that strangers who discovered their
unexpected existence should be curious and want to look at them
and their houses.
The boys wandered about as if they were casual explorers, who
having reached the place by chance were interested in all they
saw. They went into the little Gasthaus and got some black bread
and sausage and some milk. The mountaineer owner was a brawny
fellow who understood some German. He told them that few
strangers knew of the village but that bold hunters and climbers
came for sport. In the forests on the mountain sides were bears
and, in the high places, chamois. Now and again, some great
gentlemen came with parties of the daring kind--very great
gentlemen indeed, he said, shaking his head with pride. There
was one who had castles in other mountains, but he liked best to
come here. Marco began to wonder if several strange things might
not be true if great gentlemen sometimes climbed to the
mysterious place. But he had not been sent to give the Sign to a
great gentleman. He had been sent to give it to an old woman
with eyes like an eagle which was young.
He had a sketch in his sleeve, with that of her face, of her
steep-roofed, black-beamed, balconied house. If they walked
about a little, they would be sure to come upon it in this tiny
place. Then he could go in and ask her for a drink of water.
They roamed about for an hour after they left the Gasthaus. They
went into the little church and looked at the graveyard and
wondered if it was not buried out of all sight in the winter.
After they had done this, they sauntered out and walked through
the huddled clusters of houses, examining each one as they drew
near it and passed.
``I see it!'' The Rat exclaimed at last. ``It is that very oldlooking
one standing a little way from the rest. It is not as
tumbled down as most of them. And there are some red flowers on
the balcony.''
``Yes! That's it!'' said Marco.
They walked up to the low black door and, as he stopped on the
threshold, Marco took off his cap. He did this because, sitting
in the doorway on a low wooden chair, the old, old woman with the
eagle eyes was sitting knitting.
There was no one else in the room and no one anywhere within
sight. When the old, old woman looked up at him with her young
eagle's eyes, holding her head high on her long neck, Marco knew
he need not ask for water or for anything else.
``The Lamp is lighted,'' he said, in his low but strong and clear
young voice.
She dropped her knitting upon her knees and gazed at him a moment
in silence. She knew German it was clear, for it was in German
she answered him.
``God be thanked!'' she said. ``Come in, young Bearer of the
Sign, and bring your friend in with you. I live alone and not a
soul is within hearing.''
She was a wonderful old woman. Neither Marco nor The Rat would
live long enough to forget the hours they spent in her strange
dark house. She kept them and made them spend the night with
her.
``It is quite safe,'' she said. ``I live alone since my man fell
into the crevasse and was killed because his rope broke when he
was trying to save his comrade. So I have two rooms to spare and
sometimes climbers are glad to sleep in them. Mine is a good
warm house and I am well known in the village. You are very
young,'' she added shaking her head. ``You are very young. You
must have good blood in your veins to be trusted with this.''
``I have my father's blood,'' answered Marco.
``You are like some one I once saw,'' the old woman said, and her
eagle eyes set themselves hard upon him. ``Tell me your name.''
There was no reason why he should not tell it to her.
``It is Marco Loristan,'' he said.
``What! It is that!'' she cried out, not loud but low.
To Marco's amazement she got up from her chair and stood before
him, showing what a tall old woman she really was. There was a
startled, even an agitated, look in her face. And suddenly she
actually made a sort of curtsey to him--bending her knee as
peasants do when they pass a shrine.
``It is that!'' she said again. ``And yet they dare let you go
on a journey like this! That speaks for your courage and for
theirs.''
But Marco did not know what she meant. Her strange obeisance
made him feel awkward. He stood up because his training had told
him that when a woman stands a man also rises.
``The name speaks for the courage,'' he said, ``because it is my
father's.''
She watched him almost anxiously.
``You do not even know!'' she breathed--and it was an exclamation
and not a question.
``I know what I have been told to do,'' he answered. ``I do not
ask anything else.''
``Who is that?'' she asked, pointing to The Rat.
``He is the friend my father sent with me,'' said Marco smiling.
``He called him my aide-de-camp. It was a sort of joke because
we had played soldiers together.''
It seemed as if she were obliged to collect her thoughts. She
stood with her hand at her mouth, looking down at the earth
floor.
``God guard you!'' she said at last. ``You are very--very
young!''
``But all his years,'' The Rat broke in, ``he has been in
training for just this thing. He did not know it was training,
but it was. A soldier who had been trained for thirteen years
would know his work.''
He was so eager that he forgot she could not understand English.
Marco translated what he said into German and added: ``What he
says is true.''
She nodded her head, still with questioning and anxious eyes.
``Yes. Yes,'' she muttered. ``But you are very young.'' Then
she asked in a hesitating way:
``Will you not sit down until I do?''
``No,'' answered Marco. ``I would not sit while my mother or
grandmother stood.''
``Then I must sit--and forget,'' she said.
She passed her hand over her face as though she were sweeping
away the sudden puzzled trouble in her expression. Then she sat
down, as if she had obliged herself to become again the old
peasant she had been when they entered.
``All the way up the mountain you wondered why an old woman
should be given the Sign,'' she said. ``You asked each other how
she could be of use.''
Neither Marco nor The Rat said anything.
``When I was young and fresh,'' she went on. ``I went to a
castle over the frontier to be foster-mother to a child who was
born a great noble--one who was near the throne. He loved me and
I loved him. He was a strong child and he grew up a great hunter
and climber. When he was not ten years old, my man taught him to
climb. He always loved these mountains better than his own. He
comes to see me as if he were only a young mountaineer. He
sleeps in the room there,'' with a gesture over her shoulder into
the darkness. ``He has great power and, if he chooses to do a
thing, he will do it--just as he will attack the biggest bear or
climb the most dangerous peak. He is one who can bring things
about. It is very safe to talk in this room.''
Then all was quite clear. Marco and The Rat understood.
No more was said about the Sign. It had been given and that was
enough. The old woman told them that they must sleep in one of
her bedrooms. The next morning one of her neighbors was going
down to the valley with a cart and he would help them on their
way. The Rat knew that she was thinking of his crutches and he
became restless.
``Tell her,'' he said to Marco, ``how I have trained myself until
I can do what any one else can. And tell her I am growing
stronger every day. Tell her I'll show her what I can do. Your
father wouldn't have let me come as your aide if I hadn't proved
to him that I wasn't a cripple. Tell her. She thinks I'm no
use.''
Marco explained and the old woman listened attentively. When The
Rat got up and swung himself about up and down the steep path
near her house she seemed relieved. His extraordinary dexterity
and firm swiftness evidently amazed her and gave her a confidence
she had not felt at first.
``If he has taught himself to be like that just for love of your
father, he will go to the end,'' she said. ``It is more than one
could believe, that a pair of crutches could do such things.''
The Rat was pacified and could afterwards give himself up to
watching her as closely as he wished to. He was soon ``working
out'' certain things in his mind. What he watched was her way of
watching Marco. It was as if she were fascinated and could not
keep her eyes from him. She told them stories about the
mountains and the strangers who came to climb with guides or to
hunt. She told them about the storms, which sometimes seemed
about to put an end to the little world among the crags. She
described the winter when the snow buried them and the strong
ones were forced to dig out the weak and some lived for days
under the masses of soft whiteness, glad to keep their cows or
goats in their rooms that they might share the warmth of their
bodies. The villages were forced to be good neighbors to each
other, for the man who was not ready to dig out a hidden chimney
or buried door to-day might be left to freeze and starve in his
snow tomb next week. Through the worst part of the winter no
creature from the world below could make way to them to find out
whether they were all dead or alive.
While she talked, she watched Marco as if she were always asking
herself some question about him. The Rat was sure that she liked
him and greatly admired his strong body and good looks. It was
not necessary for him to carry himself slouchingly in her
presence and he looked glowing and noble. There was a sort of
reverence in her manner when she spoke to him. She reminded him
of Lazarus more than once. When she gave them their evening
meal, she insisted on waiting on him with a certain respectful
ceremony. She would not sit at table with him, and The Rat began
to realize that she felt that he himself should be standing to
serve him.
``She thinks I ought to stand behind your chair as Lazarus stands
behind your father's,'' he said to Marco. ``Perhaps an aide
ought to do it. Shall I? I believe it would please her.''
``A Bearer of the Sign is not a royal person,'' answered Marco.
``My father would not like it--and I should not. We are only two
boys.''
It was very wonderful when, after their supper was over, they all
three sat together before the fire.
The red glow of the bed of wood-coal and the orange yellow of the
flame from the big logs filled the room with warm light, which
made a mellow background for the figure of the old woman as she
sat in her low chair and told them more and more enthralling
stories.
Her eagle eyes glowed and her long neck held her head splendidly
high as she described great feats of courage and endurance or
almost superhuman daring in aiding those in awesome peril, and,
when she glowed most in the telling, they always knew that the
hero of the adventure had been her foster-child who was the baby
born a great noble and near the throne. To her, he was the most
splendid and adorable of human beings. Almost an emperor, but so
warm and tender of heart that he never forgot the long- past days
when she had held him on her knee and told him tales of chamoisand
bear-hunting, and of the mountain-tops in mid- winter. He
was her sun-god.
``Yes! Yes!'' she said. `` `Good Mother,' he calls me. And I
bake him a cake on the hearth, as I did when he was ten years old
and my man was teaching him to climb. And when he chooses that a
thing shall be done--done it is! He is a great lord.''
The flames had died down and only the big bed of red coal made
the room glow, and they were thinking of going to bed when the
old woman started very suddenly, turning her head as if to
listen.
Marco and The Rat heard nothing, but they saw that she did and
they sat so still that each held his breath. So there was utter
stillness for a few moments. Utter stillness.
Then they did hear something--a clear silver sound, piercing the
pure mountain air.
The old woman sprang upright with the fire of delight in her
eyes.
``It is his silver horn!'' she cried out striking her hands
together. ``It is his own call to me when he is coming. He has
been hunting somewhere and wants to sleep in his good bed here.
Help me to put on more faggots,'' to The Rat, ``so that he will
see the flame of them through the open door as he comes.''
``Shall we be in the way?'' said Marco. ``We can go at once.''
She was going towards the door to open it and she stopped a
moment and turned.
``No, no!'' she said. ``He must see your face. He will want to
see it. I want him to see--how young you are.''
She threw the door wide open and they heard the silver horn send
out its gay call again. The brushwood and faggots The Rat had
thrown on the coals crackled and sparkled and roared into fine
flames, which cast their light into the road and threw out in
fine relief the old figure which stood on the threshold and
looked so tall.
And in but a few minutes her great lord came to her. And in his
green hunting-suit with its green hat and eagle's feather he was
as splendid as she had said he was. He was big and royallooking
and laughing and he bent and kissed her as if he had been
her own son.
``Yes, good Mother,'' they heard him say. ``I want my warm bed
and one of your good suppers. I sent the others to the
Gasthaus.''
He came into the redly glowing room and his head almost touched
the blackened rafters. Then he saw the two boys.
``Who are these, good Mother?'' he asked.
She lifted his hand and kissed it.
``They are the Bearers of the Sign,'' she said rather softly. ``
`The Lamp is lighted.' ''
Then his whole look changed. His laughing face became quite
grave and for a moment looked even anxious. Marco knew it was
because he was startled to find them only boys. He made a step
forward to look at them more closely.
``The Lamp is lighted! And you two bear the Sign!'' he
exclaimed. Marco stood out in the fire glow that he might see
him well. He saluted with respect.
``My name is Marco Loristan, Highness,'' he said. ``And my
father sent me.''
The change which came upon his face then was even greater than at
first. For a second, Marco even felt that there was a flash of
alarm in it. But almost at once that passed.
``Loristan is a great man and a great patriot,'' he said. ``If
he sent you, it is because he knows you are the one safe
messenger. He has worked too long for Samavia not to know what
he does.''
Marco saluted again. He knew what it was right to say next.
``If we have your Highness's permission to retire,'' he said,
``we will leave you and go to bed. We go down the mountain at
sunrise.''
``Where next?'' asked the hunter, looking at him with curious
intentness.
``To Vienna, Highness,'' Marco answered.
His questioner held out his hand, still with the intent interest
in his eyes.
``Good night, fine lad,'' he said. ``Samavia has need to vaunt
itself on its Sign-bearer. God go with you.''
He stood and watched him as he went toward the room in which he
and his aide-de-camp were to sleep. The Rat followed him
closely. At the little back door the old, old woman stood,
having opened it for them. As Marco passed and bade her good
night, he saw that she again made the strange obeisance, bending
the knee as he went by.
XXIV
``HOW SHALL WE FIND HIM?''
In Vienna they came upon a pageant. In celebration of a
century-past victory the Emperor drove in state and ceremony to
attend at the great cathedral and to do honor to the ancient
banners and laurel-wreathed statue of a long-dead soldier-prince.
The broad pavements of the huge chief thoroughfare were crowded
with a cheering populace watching the martial pomp and splendor
as it passed by with marching feet, prancing horses, and glitter
of scabbard and chain, which all seemed somehow part of music in
triumphant bursts.
The Rat was enormously thrilled by the magnificence of the
imperial place. Its immense spaces, the squares and gardens,
reigned over by statues of emperors, and warriors, and queens
made him feel that all things on earth were possible. The
palaces and stately piles of architecture, whose surmounting
equestrian bronzes ramped high in the air clear cut and beautiful
against the sky, seemed to sweep out of his world all atmosphere
but that of splendid cities down whose broad avenues emperors
rode with waving banners, tramping, jangling soldiery before and
behind, and golden trumpets blaring forth. It seemed as if it
must always be like this--that lances and cavalry and emperors
would never cease to ride by. ``I should like to stay here a
long time,'' he said almost as if he were in a dream. ``I should
like to see it all.''
He leaned on his crutches in the crowd and watched the glitter of
the passing pageant. Now and then he glanced at Marco, who
watched also with a steady eye which, The Rat saw, nothing would
escape: How absorbed he always was in the Game! How impossible
it was for him to forget it or to remember it only as a boy
would! Often it seemed that he was not a boy at all. And the
Game, The Rat knew in these days, was a game no more but a thing
of deep and deadly earnest--a thing which touched kings and
thrones, and concerned the ruling and swaying of great countries.
And they--two lads pushed about by the crowd as they stood and
stared at the soldiers--carried with them that which was even now
lighting the Lamp. The blood in The Rat's veins ran quickly and
made him feel hot as he remembered certain thoughts which had
forced themselves into his mind during the past weeks. As his
brain had the trick of ``working things out,'' it had, during the
last fortnight at least, been following a wonderful even if
rather fantastic and feverish fancy. A mere trifle had set it at
work, but, its labor once begun, things which might have once
seemed to be trifles appeared so no longer. When Marco was
asleep, The Rat lay awake through thrilled and sometimes almost
breathless midnight hours, looking backward and recalling every
detail of their lives since they had known each other. Sometimes
it seemed to him that almost everything he remembered--the Game
from first to last above all--had pointed to but one thing. And
then again he would all at once feel that he was a fool and had
better keep his head steady. Marco, he knew, had no wild
fancies. He had learned too much and his mind was too well
balanced. He did not try to ``work out things.'' He only
thought of what he was under orders to do.
``But,'' said The Rat more than once in these midnight hours,
``if it ever comes to a draw whether he is to be saved or I am,
he is the one that must come to no harm. Killing can't take
long-- and his father sent me with him.''
This thought passed through his mind as the tramping feet went
by. As a sudden splendid burst of approaching music broke upon
his ear, a queer look twisted his face. He realized the contrast
between this day and that first morning behind the churchyard,
when he had sat on his platform among the Squad and looked up and
saw Marco in the arch at the end of the passage. And because he
had been good-looking and had held himself so well, he had thrown
a stone at him. Yes--blind gutter-bred fool that he'd been:--his
first greeting to Marco had been a stone, just because he was
what he was. As they stood here in the crowd in this far-off
foreign city, it did not seem as if it could be true that it was
he who had done it.
He managed to work himself closer to Marco's side. ``Isn't it
splendid?'' he said, ``I wish I was an emperor myself. I'd have
these fellows out like this every day.'' He said it only because
he wanted to say something, to speak, as a reason for getting
closer to him. He wanted to be near enough to touch him and feel
that they were really together and that the whole thing was not a
sort of magnificent dream from which he might awaken to find
himself lying on his heap of rags in his corner of the room in
Bone Court.
The crowd swayed forward in its eagerness to see the principal
feature of the pageant--the Emperor in his carriage. The Rat
swayed forward with the rest to look as it passed.
A handsome white-haired and mustached personage in splendid
uniform decorated with jeweled orders and with a cascade of
emerald-green plumes nodding in his military hat gravely saluted
the shouting people on either side. By him sat a man uniformed,
decorated, and emerald-plumed also, but many years younger.
Marco's arm touched The Rat's almost at the same moment that his
own touched Marco. Under the nodding plumes each saw the rather
tired and cynical pale face, a sketch of which was hidden in the
slit in Marco's sleeve.
``Is the one who sits with the Emperor an Archduke?'' Marco asked
the man nearest to him in the crowd. The man answered amiably
enough. No, he was not, but he was a certain Prince, a
descendant of the one who was the hero of the day. He was a
great favorite of the Emperor's and was also a great personage,
whose palace contained pictures celebrated throughout Europe.
``He pretends it is only pictures he cares for,'' he went on,
shrugging his shoulders and speaking to his wife, who had begun
to listen, ``but he is a clever one, who amuses himself with
things he professes not to concern himself about--big things.
It's his way to look bored, and interested in nothing, but it's
said he's a wizard for knowing dangerous secrets.''
``Does he live at the Hofburg with the Emperor?'' asked the
woman, craning her neck to look after the imperial carriage.
``No, but he's often there. The Emperor is lonely and bored too,
no doubt, and this one has ways of making him forget his
troubles. It's been told me that now and then the two dress
themselves roughly, like common men, and go out into the city to
see what it's like to rub shoulders with the rest of the world.
I daresay it's true. I should like to try it myself once in a
while, if I had to sit on a throne and wear a crown.''
The two boys followed the celebration to its end. They managed
to get near enough to see the entrance to the church where the
service was held and to get a view of the ceremonies at the
banner-draped and laurel-wreathed statue. They saw the man with
the pale face several times, but he was always so enclosed that
it was not possible to get within yards of him. It happened
once, however, that he looked through a temporary break in the
crowding
people and saw a dark strong-featured and remarkably intent boy's
face, whose vivid scrutiny of him caught his eye. There was
something in the fixedness of its attention which caused him to
look at it curiously for a few seconds, and Marco met his gaze
squarely.
``Look at me! Look at me!'' the boy was saying to him mentally.
``I have a message for you. A message!''
The tired eyes in the pale face rested on him with a certain
growing light of interest and curiosity, but the crowding people
moved and the temporary break closed up, so that the two could
see each other no more. Marco and The Rat were pushed backward
by those taller and stronger than themselves until they were on
the outskirts of the crowd.
``Let us go to the Hofburg,'' said Marco. ``They will come back
there, and we shall see him again even if we can't get near.''
To the Hofburg they made their way through the less crowded
streets, and there they waited as near to the great palace as
they could get. They were there when, the ceremonies at an end,
the imperial carriages returned, but, though they saw their man
again, they were at some distance from him and he did not see
them.
Then followed four singular days. They were singular days
because they were full of tantalizing incidents. Nothing seemed
easier than to hear talk of, and see the Emperor's favorite, but
nothing was more impossible than to get near to him. He seemed
rather a favorite with the populace, and the common people of the
shopkeeping or laboring classes were given to talking freely of
him--of where he was going and what he was doing. To-night he
would be sure to be at this great house or that, at this ball or
that banquet. There was no difficulty in discovering that he
would be sure to go to the opera, or the theatre, or to drive to
Schonbrunn with his imperial master. Marco and The Rat heard
casual speech of him again and again, and from one part of the
city to the other they followed and waited for him. But it was
like chasing a will-o'-the-wisp. He was evidently too brilliant
and important a person to be allowed to move about alone. There
were always people with him who seemed absorbed in his languid
cynical talk. Marco thought that he never seemed to care much
for his companions, though they on their part always seemed
highly entertained by what he was saying. It was noticeable that
they laughed a great deal, though he himself scarcely even
smiled.
``He's one of those chaps with the trick of saying witty things
as if he didn't see the fun in them himself,'' The Rat summed him
up. ``Chaps like that are always cleverer than the other kind.''
``He's too high in favor and too rich not to be followed about,''
they heard a man in a shop say one day, ``but he gets tired of
it. Sometimes, when he's too bored to stand it any longer, he
gives it out that he's gone into the mountains somewhere, and all
the time he's shut up alone with his pictures in his own
palace.''
That very night The Rat came in to their attic looking pale and
disappointed. He had been out to buy some food after a long and
arduous day in which they had covered much ground, had seen their
man three times, and each time under circumstances which made him
more inaccessible than ever. They had come back to their poor
quarters both tired and ravenously hungry.
The Rat threw his purchase on to the table and himself into a
chair.
``He's gone to Budapest,'' he said. ``NOW how shall we find
him?''
Marco was rather pale also, and for a moment he looked paler.
The day had been a hard one, and in their haste to reach places
at a long distance from each other they had forgotten their need
of food.
They sat silent for a few moments because there seemed to be
nothing to say. ``We are too tired and hungry to be able to
think well,'' Marco said at last. ``Let us eat our supper and
then go to sleep. Until we've had a rest, we must `let go.' ''
``Yes. There's no good in talking when you're tired,'' The Rat
answered a trifle gloomily. ``You don't reason straight. We
must `let go.' ''
Their meal was simple but they ate well and without words.
Even when they had finished and undressed for the night, they
said very little.
``Where do our thoughts go when we are asleep,'' The Rat inquired
casually after he was stretched out in the darkness. ``They must
go somewhere. Let's send them to find out what to do next.''
``It's not as still as it was on the Gaisberg. You can hear the
city roaring,'' said Marco drowsily from his dark corner. ``We
must make a ledge--for ourselves.''
Sleep made it for them--deep, restful, healthy sleep. If they
had been more resentful of their ill luck and lost labor, it
would have come less easily and have been less natural. In their
talks of strange things they had learned that one great secret of
strength and unflagging courage is to know how to ``let go''--to
cease thinking over an anxiety until the right moment comes. It
was their habit to ``let go'' for hours sometimes, and wander
about looking at places and things--galleries, museums, palaces,
giving themselves up with boyish pleasure and eagerness to all
they saw. Marco was too intimate with the things worth seeing,
and The Rat too curious and feverishly wide-awake to allow of
their missing much.
The Rat's image of the world had grown until it seemed to know no
boundaries which could hold its wealth of wonders. He wanted to
go on and on and see them all.
When Marco opened his eyes in the morning, he found The Rat lying
looking at him. Then they both sat up in bed at the same time.
``I believe we are both thinking the same thing,'' Marco said.
They frequently discovered that they were thinking the same
things.
``So do I,'' answered The Rat. ``It shows how tired we were that
we didn't think of it last night.''
``Yes, we are thinking the same thing,'' said Marco. ``We have
both remembered what we heard about his shutting himself up alone
with his pictures and making people believe he had gone away.''
``He's in his palace now,'' The Rat announced.
``Do you feel sure of that, too?'' asked Marco. ``Did you wake
up and feel sure of it the first thing?''
``Yes,'' answered The Rat. ``As sure as if I'd heard him say it
himself.''
``So did I,'' said Marco.
``That's what our thoughts brought back to us,'' said The Rat,
``when we `let go' and sent them off last night.'' He sat up
hugging his knees and looking straight before him for some time
after this, and Marco did not interrupt his meditations.
The day was a brilliant one, and, though their attic had only one
window, the sun shone in through it as they ate their breakfast.
After it, they leaned on the window's ledge and talked about the
Prince's garden. They talked about it because it was a place
open to the public and they had walked round it more than once.
The palace, which was not a large one, stood in the midst of it.
The Prince was good-natured enough to allow quiet and
well-behaved people to saunter through. It was not a fashionable
promenade but a pleasant retreat for people who sometimes took
their work or books and sat on the seats placed here and there
among the shrubs and flowers.
``When we were there the first time, I noticed two things,''
Marco said. ``There is a stone balcony which juts out from the
side of the palace which looks on the Fountain Garden. That day
there were chairs on it as if the Prince and his visitors
sometimes sat there. Near it, there was a very large evergreen
shrub and I saw that there was a hollow place inside it. If some
one wanted to stay in the gardens all night to watch the windows
when they were lighted and see if any one came out alone upon the
balcony, he could hide himself in the hollow place and stay there
until the morning.''
``Is there room for two inside the shrub?'' The Rat asked.
``No. I must go alone,'' said Marco.
XXV
A VOICE IN THE NIGHT
Late that afternoon there wandered about the gardens two quiet,
inconspicuous, rather poorly dressed boys. They looked at the
palace, the shrubs, and the flower-beds, as strangers usually
did, and they sat on the seats and talked as people were
accustomed to seeing boys talk together. It was a sunny day and
exceptionally warm, and there were more saunterers and sitters
than usual, which was perhaps the reason why the portier at the
entrance gates gave such slight notice to the pair that he did
not observe that, though two boys came in, only one went out. He
did not, in fact, remember, when he saw The Rat swing by on his
crutches at closing-time, that he had entered in company with a
dark-haired lad who walked without any aid. It happened that,
when The Rat passed out, the portier at the entrance was much
interested in the aspect of the sky, which was curiously
threatening. There had been heavy clouds hanging about all day
and now and then blotting out the sunshine entirely, but the sun
had refused to retire altogether. Just now, however, the clouds
had piled themselves in thunderous, purplish mountains, and the
sun had been forced to set behind them.
``It's been a sort of battle since morning,'' the portier said.
``There will be some crashes and cataracts to-night.'' That was
what The Rat had thought when they had sat in the Fountain Garden
on a seat which gave them a good view of the balcony and the big
evergreen shrub, which they knew had the hollow in the middle,
though its circumference was so imposing. ``If there should be a
big storm, the evergreen will not save you much, though it may
keep off the worst,'' The Rat said. ``I wish there was room for
two.''
He would have wished there was room for two if he had seen Marco
marching to the stake. As the gardens emptied, the boys rose and
walked round once more, as if on their way out. By the time they
had sauntered toward the big evergreen, nobody was in the
Fountain Garden, and the last loiterers were moving toward the
arched stone entrance to the streets.
When they drew near one side of the evergreen, the two were
together. When The Rat swung out on the other side of it, he was
alone! No one noticed that anything had happened; no one looked
back. So The Rat swung down the walks and round the flower-beds
and passed into the street. And the portier looked at the sky
and made his remark about the ``crashes'' and ``cataracts.''
As the darkness came on, the hollow in the shrub seemed a very
safe place. It was not in the least likely that any one would
enter the closed gardens; and if by rare chance some servant
passed through, he would not be in search of people who wished to
watch all night in the middle of an evergreen instead of going to
bed and to sleep. The hollow was well inclosed with greenery,
and there was room to sit down when one was tired of standing.
Marco stood for a long time because, by doing so, he could see
plainly the windows opening on the balcony if he gently pushed
aside some flexible young boughs. He had managed to discover in
his first visit to the gardens that the windows overlooking the
Fountain Garden were those which belonged to the Prince's own
suite of rooms. Those which opened on to the balcony lighted his
favorite apartment, which contained his best-loved books and
pictures and in which he spent most of his secluded leisure
hours.
Marco watched these windows anxiously. If the Prince had not
gone to Budapest,--if he were really only in retreat, and hiding
from his gay world among his treasures,--he would be living in
his favorite rooms and lights would show themselves. And if
there were lights, he might pass before a window because, since
he was inclosed in his garden, he need not fear being seen. The
twilight deepened into darkness and, because of the heavy clouds,
it was very dense. Faint gleams showed themselves in the lower
part of the palace, but none was lighted in the windows Marco
watched. He waited so long that it became evident that none was
to be lighted at all. At last he loosed his hold on the young
boughs and, after standing a few moments in thought, sat down
upon the earth in the midst of his embowered tent. The Prince
was not in his retreat; he was probably not in Vienna, and the
rumor of his journey to Budapest had no doubt been true. So much
time lost through making a mistake--but it was best to have made
the venture. Not to have made it would have been to lose a
chance. The entrance was closed for the night and there was no
getting out of the gardens until they were opened for the next
day. He must stay in his hiding- place until the time when
people began to come and bring their books and knitting and sit
on the seats. Then he could stroll out without attracting
attention. But he had the night before him to spend as best he
could. That would not matter at all. He could tuck his cap
under his head and go to sleep on the ground. He could command
himself to waken once every half-hour and look for the lights.
He would not go to sleep until it was long past midnight--so long
past that there would not be one chance in a hundred that
anything could happen. But the clouds which made the night so
dark were giving forth low rumbling growls. At intervals a
threatening gleam of light shot across them and a sudden swish of
wind rushed through the trees in the garden. This happened
several times, and then Marco began to hear the patter of
raindrops. They were heavy and big drops, but few at first, and
then there was a new and more powerful rush of wind, a jagged
dart of light in the sky, and a tremendous crash. After that the
clouds tore themselves open and poured forth their contents in
floods. After the protracted struggle of the day it all seemed
to happen at once, as if a horde of huge lions had at one moment
been let loose: flame after flame of lightning, roar and crash
and sharp reports of thunder, shrieks of hurricane wind, torrents
of rain, as if some tidal-wave of the skies had gathered and
rushed and burst upon the earth. It was such a storm as people
remember for a lifetime and which in few lifetimes is seen at
all.
Marco stood still in the midst of the rage and flooding, blinding
roar of it. After the first few minutes he knew he could do
nothing to shield himself. Down the garden paths he heard
cataracts rushing. He held his cap pressed against his eyes
because he seemed to stand in the midst of darting flames. The
crashes, cannon reports and thunderings, and the jagged streams
of light came so close to one another that he seemed deafened as
well as blinded. He wondered if he should ever be able to hear
human voices again when it was over. That he was drenched to the
skin and that the water poured from his clothes as if he were
himself a cataract was so small a detail that he was scarcely
aware of it. He stood still, bracing his body, and waited. If
he had been a Samavian soldier in the trenches and such a storm
had broken upon him and his comrades, they could only have braced
themselves and waited. This was what he found himself thinking
when the tumult and downpour were at their worst. There were men
who had waited in the midst of a rain of bullets.
It was not long after this thought had come to him that there
occurred the first temporary lull in the storm. Its fury perhaps
reached its height and broke at that moment. A yellow flame had
torn its jagged way across the heavens, and an earth-rending
crash had thundered itself into rumblings which actually died
away before breaking forth again. Marco took his cap from his
eyes and drew a long breath. He drew two long breaths. It was
as he began drawing a third and realizing the strange feeling of
the almost stillness about him that he heard a new kind of sound
at the side of the garden nearest his hiding-place. It sounded
like the creak of a door opening somewhere in the wall behind the
laurel hedge. Some one was coming into the garden by a private
entrance. He pushed aside the young boughs again and tried to
see, but the darkness was too dense. Yet he could hear if the
thunder would not break again. There was the sound of feet on
the wet gravel, the footsteps of more than one person coming
toward where he stood, but not as if afraid of being heard;
merely as if they were at liberty to come in by what entrance
they chose. Marco remained very still. A sudden hope gave him a
shock of joy. If the man with the tired face chose to hide
himself from his acquaintances, he might choose to go in and out
by a private entrance. The footsteps drew near, crushing the wet
gravel, passed by, and seemed to pause somewhere near the
balcony; and them flame lit up the sky again and the thunder
burst forth once more.
But this was its last greal peal. The storm was at an end. Only
fainter and fainter rumblings and mutterings and paler and paler
darts followed. Even they were soon over, and the cataracts in
the paths had rushed themselves silent. But the darkness was
still deep.
It was deep to blackness in the hollow of the evergreen. Marco
stood in it, streaming with rain, but feeling nothing because he
was full of thought. He pushed aside his greenery and kept his
eyes on the place in the blackness where the windows must be,
though he could not see them. It seemed that he waited a long
time, but he knew it only seemed so really. He began to breathe
quickly because he was waiting for something.
Suddenly he saw exactly where the windows were--because they were
all lighted!
His feeling of relief was great, but it did not last very long.
It was true that something had been gained in the certainty that
his man had not left Vienna. But what next? It would not be so
easy to follow him if he chose only to go out secretly at night.
What next? To spend the rest of the night watching a lighted
window was not enough. To-morrow night it might not be lighted.
But he kept his gaze fixed upon it. He tried to fix all his will
and thought-power on the person inside the room. Perhaps he
could reach him and make him listen, even though he would not
know that any one was speaking to him. He knew that thoughts
were strong things. If angry thoughts in one man's mind will
create anger in the mind of another, why should not sane messages
cross the line?
``I must speak to you. I must speak to you!'' he found himself
saying in a low intense voice. ``I am outside here waiting.
Listen! I must speak to you!''
He said it many times and kept his eyes fixed upon the window
which opened on to the balcony. Once he saw a man's figure cross
the room, but he could not be sure who it was. The last distant
rumblings of thunder had died away and the clouds were breaking.
It was not long before the dark mountainous billows broke apart,
and a brilliant full moon showed herself sailing in the rift,
suddenly flooding everything with light. Parts of the garden
were silver white, and the tree shadows were like black velvet.
A silvery lance pierced even into the hollow of Marco's evergreen
and struck across his face.
Perhaps it was this sudden change which attracted the attention
of those inside the balconied room. A man's figure appeared at
the long windows. Marco saw now that it was the Prince. He
opened the windows and stepped out on to the balcony.
``It is all over,'' he said quietly. And he stood with his face
lifted, looking at the great white sailing moon.
He stood very still and seemed for the moment to forget the world
and himself. It was a wonderful, triumphant queen of a moon.
But something brought him back to earth. A low, but strong and
clear, boy-voice came up to him from the garden path below.
``The Lamp is lighted. The Lamp is lighted,'' it said, and the
words sounded almost as if some one were uttering a prayer. They
seemed to call to him, to arrest him, to draw him.
He stood still a few seconds in dead silence. Then he bent over
the balustrade. The moonlight had not broken the darkness below.
``That is a boy's voice,'' he said in a low tone, ``but I cannot
see who is speaking.''
``Yes, it is a boy's voice,'' it answered, in a way which somehow
moved him, because it was so ardent. ``It is the son of Stefan
Loristan. The Lamp is lighted.''
``Wait. I am coming down to you,'' the Prince said.
In a few minutes Marco heard a door open gently not far from
where he stood. Then the man he had been following so many days
appeared at his side.
``How long have you been here?'' he asked.
``Before the gates closed. I hid myself in the hollow of the big
shrub there, Highness,'' Marco answered.
``Then you were out in the storm?''
``Yes, Highness.''
The Prince put his hand on the boy's shoulder. ``I cannot see
you --but it is best to stand in the shadow. You are drenched to
the skin.''
``I have been able to give your Highness--the Sign,'' Marco
whispered. ``A storm is nothing.''
There was a silence. Marco knew that his companion was pausing
to turn something over in his mind.
``So-o?'' he said slowly, at length. ``The Lamp is lighted, And
YOU are sent to bear the Sign.'' Something in his voice made
Marco feel that he was smiling.
``What a race you are! What a race--you Samavian Loristans!''
He paused as if to think the thing over again.
``I want to see your face,'' he said next. ``Here is a tree with
a shaft of moonlight striking through the branches. Let us step
aside and stand under it.''
Marco did as he was told. The shaft of moonlight fell upon his
uplifted face and showed its young strength and darkness, quite
splendid for the moment in a triumphant glow of joy in obstacles
overcome. Raindrops hung on his hair, but he did not look
draggled, only very wet and picturesque. He had reached his man.
He had given the Sign.
The Prince looked him over with interested curiosity.
``Yes,'' he said in his cool, rather dragging voice. ``You are
the son of Stefan Loristan. Also you must be taken care of. You
must come with me. I have trained my household to remain in its
own quarters until I require its service. I have attached to my
own apartments a good safe little room where I sometimes keep
people.
You can dry your clothes and sleep there. When the gardens are
opened again, the rest will be easy.''
But though he stepped out from under the trees and began to move
towards the palace in the shadow, Marco noticed that he moved
hesitatingly, as if he had not quite decided what he should do.
He stopped rather suddenly and turned again to Marco, who was
following him.
``There is some one in the room I just now left,'' he said, ``an
old man--whom it might interest to see you. It might also be a
good thing for him to feel interest in you. I choose that he
shall see you --as you are.''
``I am at your command, Highness,'' Marco answered. He knew his
companion was smiling again.
``You have been in training for more centuries than you know,''
he said; ``and your father has prepared you to encounter the
unexpected without surprise.''
They passed under the balcony and paused at a low stone doorway
hidden behind shrubs. The door was a beautiful one, Marco saw
when it was opened, and the corridor disclosed was beautiful
also, though it had an air of quiet and aloofness which was not
so much secret as private. A perfect though narrow staircase
mounted from it to the next floor. After ascending it, the
Prince led the way through a short corridor and stopped at the
door at the end of it. ``We are going in here,'' he said.
It was a wonderful room--the one which opened on to the balcony.
Each piece of furniture in it, the hangings, the tapestries, and
pictures on the wall were all such as might well have found
themselves adorning a museum. Marco remembered the common report
of his escort's favorite amusement of collecting wonders and
furnishing his house with the things others exhibited only as
marvels of art and handicraft. The place was rich and mellow
with exquisitely chosen beauties.
In a massive chair upon the heart sat a figure with bent head.
It was a tall old man with white hair and moustache. His elbows
rested upon the arm of his chair and he leaned his forehead on
his hand as if he were weary.
Marco's companion crossed the room and stood beside him, speaking
in a lowered voice. Marco could not at first hear what he said.
He himself stood quite still, waiting. The white-haired man
lifted his head and listened. It seemed as though almost at once
he was singularly interested. The lowered voice was slightly
raised at last and Marco heard the last two sentences:
``The only son of Stefan Loristan. Look at him.''
The old man in the chair turned slowly and looked, steadily, and
with questioning curiosity touched with grave surprise. He had
keen and clear blue eyes.
Then Marco, still erect and silent, waited again. The Prince had
merely said to him, ``an old man whom it might interest to see
you.'' He had plainly intended that, whatsoever happened, he
must make no outward sign of seeing more than he had been told he
would see --``an old man.'' It was for him to show no
astonishment or recognition. He had been brought here not to see
but to be seen. The power of remaining still under scrutiny,
which The Rat had often envied him, stood now in good stead
because he had seen the white head and tall form not many days
before, surmounted by brilliant emerald plumes, hung with jeweled
decorations, in the royal carriage, escorted by banners, and
helmets, and following troops whose tramping feet kept time to
bursts of military music while the populace bared their heads and
cheered.
``He is like his father,'' this personage said to the Prince.
``But if any one but Loristan had sent him--His looks please
me.'' Then suddenly to Marco, ``You were waiting outside while
the storm was going on?''
``Yes, sir,'' Marco answered.
Then the two exchanged some words still in the lowered voice.
``You read the news as you made your journey?'' he was asked.
``You know how Samavia stands?''
``She does not stand,'' said Marco. ``The Iarovitch and the
Maranovitch have fought as hyenas fight, until each has torn the
other into fragments--and neither has blood or strength left.''
The two glanced at each other.
``A good simile,'' said the older person. ``You are right. If a
strong party rose--and a greater power chose not to
interfere--the country might see better days.'' He looked at him
a few moments longer and then waved his hand kindly.
``You are a fine Samavian,'' he said. ``I am glad of that. You
may go. Good night.''
Marco bowed respectfully and the man with the tired face led him
out of the room.
It was just before he left him in the small quiet chamber in
which he was to sleep that the Prince gave him a final curious
glance. ``I remember now,'' he said. ``In the room, when you
answered the question about Samavia, I was sure that I had seen
you before. It was the day of the celebration. There was a
break in the crowd and I saw a boy looking at me. It was you.''
``Yes,'' said Marco, ``I have followed you each time you have
gone out since then, but I could never get near enough to speak.
To- night seemed only one chance in a thousand.''
``You are doing your work more like a man than a boy,'' was the
next speech, and it was made reflectively. ``No man could have
behaved more perfectly than you did just now, when discretion and
composure were necessary.'' Then, after a moment's pause, ``He
was deeply interested and deeply pleased. Good night.''
When the gardens had been thrown open the next morning and people
were passing in and out again, Marco passed out also. He was
obliged to tell himself two or three times that he had not
wakened from an amazing dream. He quickened his pace after he
had crossed the street, because he wanted to get home to the
attic and talk to The Rat. There was a narrow side-street it was
necessary for him to pass through if he wished to make a short
cut. As he turned into it, he saw a curious figure leaning on
crutches against a wall. It looked damp and forlorn, and he
wondered if it could be a beggar. It was not. It was The Rat,
who suddenly saw who was approaching and swung forward. His face
was pale and haggard and he looked worn and frightened. He
dragged off his cap and spoke in a voice which was hoarse as a
crow's.
``God be thanked!'' he said. ``God be thanked!'' as people
always said it when they received the Sign, alone. But there was
a kind of anguish in his voice as well as relief.
``Aide-de-camp!'' Marco cried out--The Rat had begged him to call
him so. ``What have you been doing? How long have you been
here?''
``Ever since I left you last night,'' said The Rat clutching
tremblingly at his arm as if to make sure he was real. ``If
there was not room for two in the hollow, there was room for one
in the street.
Was it my place to go off duty and leave you alone--was it?''
``You were out in the storm?''
``Weren't you?'' said The Rat fiercely. ``I huddled against the
wall as well as I could. What did I care? Crutches don't
prevent a fellow waiting. I wouldn't have left you if you'd
given me orders. And that would have been mutiny. When you did
not come out as soon as the gates opened, I felt as if my head
got on fire. How could I know what had happened? I've not the
nerve and backbone you have. I go half mad.'' For a second or
so Marco did not answer. But when he put his hand on the damp
sleeve, The Rat actually started, because it seemed as though he
were looking into the eyes of Stefan Loristan.
``You look just like your father!'' he exclaimed, in spite of
himself. ``How tall you are!''
``When you are near me,'' Marco said, in Loristan's own voice,
``when you are near me, I feel--I feel as if I were a royal
prince attended by an army. You ARE my army.'' And he pulled
off his cap with quick boyishness and added, ``God be thanked!''
The sun was warm in the attic window when they reached their
lodging, and the two leaned on the rough sill as Marco told his
story. It took some time to relate; and when he ended, he took
an envelope from his pocket and showed it to The Rat. It
contained a flat package of money.
``He gave it to me just before he opened the private door,''
Marco explained. ``And he said to me, `It will not be long now.
After Samavia, go back to London as quickly as you can--AS
QUICKLY AS YOU CAN!' ''
``I wonder--what he meant?'' The Rat said, slowly. A tremendous
thought had shot through his mind. But it was not a thought he
could speak of to Marco.
``I cannot tell. I thought that it was for some reason he did
not expect me to know,'' Marco said. ``We will do as he told us.
As quickly as we can.'' They looked over the newspapers, as they
did every day. All that could be gathered from any of them was
that the opposing armies of Samavia seemed each to have reached
the culmination of disaster and exhaustion. Which party had the
power left to take any final step which could call itself a
victory, it was impossible to say. Never had a country been in a
more desperate case.
``It is the time!'' said The Rat, glowering over his map. ``If
the Secret Party rises suddenly now, it can take Melzarr almost
without a blow. It can sweep through the country and disarm both
armies.
They're weakened--they're half starved--they're bleeding to
death; they WANT to be disarmed. Only the Iarovitch and the
Maranovitch keep on with the struggle because each is fighting
for the power to tax the people and make slaves of them. If the
Secret Party does not rise, the people will, and they'll rush on
the palaces and kill every Maranovitch and Iarovitch they find.
And serve them right!''
``Let us spend the rest of the day in studying the road-map
again,'' said Marco. ``To-night we must be on the way to
Samavia!''
XXVI
ACROSS THE FRONTIER
That one day, a week later, two tired and travel- worn
boy-mendicants should drag themselves with slow and weary feet
across the frontier line between Jiardasia and Samavia, was not
an incident to awaken suspicion or even to attract attention.
War and hunger and anguish had left the country stunned and
broken. Since the worst had happened, no one was curious as to
what would befall them next. If Jiardasia herself had become a
foe, instead of a friendly neighbor, and had sent across the
border galloping hordes of soldiery, there would only have been
more shrieks, and home-burnings, and slaughter which no one dare
resist. But, so far, Jiardasia had remained peaceful. The two
boys--one of them on crutches--had evidently traveled far on
foot. Their poor clothes were dusty and travel-stained, and they
stopped and asked for water at the first hut across the line.
The one who walked without crutches had some coarse bread in a
bag slung over his shoulder, and they sat on the roadside and ate
it as if they were hungry. The old grandmother who lived alone
in the hut sat and stared at them without any curiosity. She may
have vaguely wondered why any one crossed into Samavia in these
days. But she did not care to know their reason. Her big son
had lived in a village which belonged to the Maranovitch and he
had been called out to fight for his lords. He had not wanted to
fight and had not known what the quarrel was about, but he was
forced to obey. He had kissed his handsome wife and four sturdy
children, blubbering aloud when he left them. His village and
his good crops and his house must be left behind. Then the
Iarovitch swept through the pretty little cluster of homesteads
which belonged to their enemy. They were mad with rage because
they had met with great losses in a battle not far away, and, as
they swooped through, they burned and killed, and trampled down
fields and vineyards. The old woman's son never saw either the
burned walls of his house or the bodies of his wife and children,
because he had been killed himself in the battle for which the
Iarovitch were revenging themselves. Only the old grandmother
who lived in the hut near the frontier line and stared vacantly
at the passers-by remained alive. She wearily gazed at people
and wondered why she did not hear news from her son and her
grandchildren. But that was all.
When the boys were over the frontier and well on their way along
the roads, it was not difficult to keep out of sight if it seemed
necessary. The country was mountainous and there were deep and
thick forests by the way--forests so far-reaching and with such
thick undergrowth that full-grown men could easily have hidden
themselves. It was because of this, perhaps, that this part of
the country had seen little fighting. There was too great
opportunity for secure ambush for a foe. As the two travelers
went on, they heard of burned villages and towns destroyed, but
they were towns and villages nearer Melzarr and other
fortress-defended cities, or they were in the country surrounding
the castles and estates of powerful nobles and leaders. It was
true, as Marco had said to the white-haired personage, that the
Maranovitch and Iarovitch had fought with the savageness of
hyenas until at last the forces of each side lay torn and
bleeding, their strength, their resources, their supplies
exhausted.
Each day left them weaker and more desperate. Europe looked on
with small interest in either party but with growing desire that
the disorder should end and cease to interfere with commerce.
All this and much more Marco and The Rat knew, but, as they made
their cautious way through byways of the maimed and tortured
little country, they learned other things. They learned that the
stories of its beauty and fertility were not romances. Its
heaven-reaching mountains, its immense plains of rich verdure on
which flocks and herds might have fed by thousands, its splendor
of deep forest and broad clear rushing rivers had a primeval
majesty such as the first human creatures might have found on
earth in the days of the Garden of Eden. The two boys traveled
through forest and woodland when it was possible to leave the
road. It was safe to thread a way among huge trees and tall
ferns and young saplings. It was not always easy but it was
safe. Sometimes they saw a charcoal-burner's hut or a shelter
where a shepherd was hiding with the few sheep left to him. Each
man they met wore the same look of stony suffering in his face;
but, when the boys begged for bread and water, as was their
habit, no one refused to share the little he had. It soon became
plain to them that they were thought to be two young fugitives
whose homes had probably been destroyed and who were wandering
about with no thought but that of finding safety until the worst
was over. That one of them traveled on crutches added to their
apparent helplessness, and that he could not speak the language
of the country made him more an object of pity. The peasants did
not know what language he spoke. Sometimes a foreigner came to
find work in this small town or that. The poor lad might have
come to the country with his father and mother and then have been
caught in the whirlpool of war and tossed out on the world
parent-less. But no one asked questions. Even in their
desolation they were silent and noble people who were too
courteous for curiosity.
``In the old days they were simple and stately and kind. All
doors were open to travelers. The master of the poorest hut
uttered a blessing and a welcome when a stranger crossed his
threshold. It was the custom of the country,'' Marco said. ``I
read about it in a book of my father's. About most of the doors
the welcome was carved in stone. It was this--`The Blessing of
the Son of God, and Rest within these Walls.' ''
``They are big and strong,'' said The Rat. ``And they have good
faces. They carry themselves as if they had been drilled--both
men and women.''
It was not through the blood-drenched part of the unhappy land
their way led them, but they saw hunger and dread in the villages
they passed. Crops which should have fed the people had been
taken from them for the use of the army; flocks and herds had
been driven away, and faces were gaunt and gray. Those who had
as yet only lost crops and herds knew that homes and lives might
be torn from them at any moment. Only old men and women and
children were left to wait for any fate which the chances of war
might deal out to them.
When they were given food from some poor store, Marco would offer
a little money in return. He dare not excite suspicion by
offering much. He was obliged to let it be imagined that in his
flight from his ruined home he had been able to snatch at and
secrete some poor hoard which might save him from starvation.
Often the women would not take what he offered. Their journey
was a hard and hungry one. They must make it all on foot and
there was little food to be found. But each of them knew how to
live on scant fare. They traveled mostly by night and slept
among the ferns and undergrowth through the day. They drank from
running brooks and bathed in them. Moss and ferns made soft and
sweet-smelling beds, and trees roofed them. Sometimes they lay
long and talked while they rested. And at length a day came when
they knew they were nearing their journey's end.
``It is nearly over now,'' Marco said, after they had thrown
themselves down in the forest in the early hours of one dewy
morning. ``He said `After Samavia, go back to London as quickly
as you can --AS QUICKLY AS YOU CAN.' He said it twice. As
if--something were going to happen.''
``Perhaps it will happen more suddenly than we think--the thing
he meant,'' answered The Rat.
Suddenly he sat up on his elbow and leaned towards Marco.
``We are in Samavia!'' he said ``We two are in Samavia! And we
are near the end!''
Marco rose on his elbow also. He was very thin as a result of
hard travel and scant feeding. His thinness made his eyes look
immense and black as pits. But they burned and were beautiful
with their own fire.
``Yes,'' he said, breathing quickly. ``And though we do not know
what the end will be, we have obeyed orders. The Prince was next
to the last one. There is only one more. The old priest.''
``I have wanted to see him more than I have wanted to see any of
the others,'' The Rat said.
``So have I,'' Marco answered. ``His church is built on the side
of this mountain. I wonder what he will say to us.''
Both had the same reason for wanting to see him. In his youth he
had served in the monastery over the frontier--the one which,
till it was destroyed in a revolt, had treasured the
five-hundred-year-old story of the beautiful royal lad brought to
be hidden among the brotherhood by the ancient shepherd. In the
monastery the memory of the Lost Prince was as the memory of a
saint. It had been told that one of the early brothers, who was
a decorator and a painter, had made a picture of him with a faint
halo shining about his head. The young acolyte who had served
there must have heard wonderful legends. But the monastery had
been burned, and the young acolyte had in later years crossed the
frontier and become the priest of a few mountaineers whose little
church clung to the mountain side. He had worked hard and
faithfully and was worshipped by his people. Only the secret
Forgers of the Sword knew that his most ardent worshippers were
those with whom he prayed and to whom he gave blessings in dark
caverns under the earth, where arms piled themselves and men with
dark strong faces sat together in the dim light and laid plans
and wrought schemes.
This Marco and The Rat did not know as they talked of their
desire to see him.
``He may not choose to tell us anything,'' said Marco. ``When we
have given him the Sign, he may turn away and say nothing as some
of the others did. He may have nothing to say which we should
hear. Silence may be the order for him, too.''
It would not be a long or dangerous climb to the little church on
the rock. They could sleep or rest all day and begin it at
twilight. So after they had talked of the old priest and had
eaten their black bread, they settled themselves to sleep under
cover of the thick tall ferns.
It was a long and deep sleep which nothing disturbed. So few
human beings ever climbed the hill, except by the narrow rough
path leading to the church, that the little wild creatures had
not learned to be afraid of them. Once, during the afternoon, a
hare hopping along under the ferns to make a visit stopped by
Marco's head, and, after looking at him a few seconds with his
lustrous eyes, began to nibble the ends of his hair. He only did
it from curiosity and because he wondered if it might be a new
kind of grass, but he did not like it and stopped nibbling almost
at once, after which he looked at it again, moving the soft
sensitive end of his nose rapidly for a second or so, and then
hopped away to attend to his own affairs. A very large and
handsome green stag-beetle crawled from one end of The Rat's
crutches to the other, but, having done it, he went away also.
Two or three times a bird, searching for his dinner under the
ferns, was surprised to find the two sleeping figures, but, as
they lay so quietly, there seemed nothing to be frightened about.
A beautiful little field mouse running past discovered that there
were crumbs lying about and ate all she could find on the moss.
After that she crept into Marco's pocket and found some excellent
ones and had quite a feast. But she disturbed nobody and the
boys slept on.
It was a bird's evening song which awakened them both. The bird
alighted on the branch of a tree near them and her trill was
rippling clear and sweet. The evening air had freshened and was
fragrant with hillside scents. When Marco first rolled over and
opened his eyes, he thought the most delicious thing on earth was
to waken from sleep on a hillside at evening and hear a bird
singing. It seemed to make exquisitely real to him the fact that
he was in Samavia--that the Lamp was lighted and his work was
nearly done. The Rat awakened when he did, and for a few minutes
both lay on their backs without speaking. At last Marco said,
``The stars are coming out. We can begin to climb,
Aide-de-camp.''
Then they both got up and looked at each other.
``The last one!'' The Rat said. ``To-morrow we shall be on our
way back to London--Number 7 Philibert Place. After all the
places we've been to--what will it look like?''
``It will be like wakening out of a dream,'' said Marco. ``It's
not beautiful--Philibert Place. But HE will be there,'' And it
was as if a light lighted itself in his face and shone through
the very darkness of it.
And The Rat's face lighted in almost exactly the same way. And
he pulled off his cap and stood bare-headed. ``We've obeyed
orders,'' he said. ``We've not forgotten one. No one has
noticed us, no one has thought of us. We've blown through the
countries as if we had been grains of dust.''
Marco's head was bared, too, and his face was still shining.
``God be thanked!'' he said. ``Let us begin to climb.''
They pushed their way through the ferns and wandered in and out
through trees until they found the little path. The hill was
thickly clothed with forest and the little path was sometimes
dark and steep; but they knew that, if they followed it, they
would at last come out to a place where there were scarcely any
trees at all, and on a crag they would find the tiny church
waiting for them. The priest might not be there. They might
have to wait for him, but he would be sure to come back for
morning Mass and for vespers, wheresoever he wandered between
times.
There were many stars in the sky when at last a turn of the path
showed them the church above them. It was little and built of
rough stone. It looked as if the priest himself and his
scattered flock might have broken and carried or rolled bits of
the hill to put it together. It had the small, round,
mosque-like summit the Turks had brought into Europe in centuries
past. It was so tiny that it would hold but a very small
congregation--and close to it was a shed-like house, which was of
course the priest's.
The two boys stopped on the path to look at it.
``There is a candle burning in one of the little windows,'' said
Marco.
``There is a well near the door--and some one is beginning to
draw water,'' said The Rat, next. ``It is too dark to see who it
is. Listen!''
They listened and heard the bucket descend on the chains, and
splash in the water. Then it was drawn up, and it seemed some
one drank long. Then they saw a dim figure move forward and
stand still. Then they heard a voice begin to pray aloud, as if
the owner, being accustomed to utter solitude, did not think of
earthly hearers.
``Come,'' Marco said. And they went forward.
Because the stars were so many and the air so clear, the priest
heard their feet on the path, and saw them almost as soon as he
heard them. He ended his prayer and watched them coming. A lad
on crutches, who moved as lightly and easily as a bird--and a lad
who, even yards away, was noticeable for a bearing of his body
which was neither haughty nor proud but set him somehow aloof
from every other lad one had ever seen. A magnificent
lad--though, as he drew near, the starlight showed his face thin
and his eyes hollow as if with fatigue or hunger.
``And who is this one?'' the old priest murmured to himself.
``WHO?''
Marco drew up before him and made a respectful reverence. Then
he lifted his black head, squared his shoulders and uttered his
message for the last time.
``The Lamp is lighted, Father,'' he said. ``The Lamp is
lighted.''
The old priest stood quite still and gazed into his face. The
next moment he bent his head so that he could look at him
closely. It
seemed almost as if he were frightened and wanted to make sure of
something. At the moment it flashed through The Rat's mind that
the old, old woman on the mountain-top had looked frightened in
something the same way.
``I am an old man,'' he said. ``My eyes are not good. If I had
a light''--and he glanced towards the house.
It was The Rat who, with one whirl, swung through the door and
seized the candle. He guessed what he wanted. He held it
himself so that the flare fell on Marco's face.
The old priest drew nearer and nearer. He gasped for breath.
``You are the son of Stefan Loristan!'' he cried. ``It is HIS
SON who brings the Sign.''
He fell upon his knees and hid his face in his hands. Both the
boys heard him sobbing and praying--praying and sobbing at once.
They glanced at each other. The Rat was bursting with
excitement, but he felt a little awkward also and wondered what
Marco would do. An old fellow on his knees, crying, made a chap
feel as if he didn't know what to say. Must you comfort him or
must you let him go on?
Marco only stood quite still and looked at him with understanding
and gravity.
``Yes, Father, he said. ``I am the son of Stefan Loristan, and I
have given the Sign to all. You are the last one. The Lamp is
lighted. I could weep for gladness, too.''
The priest's tears and prayers ended. He rose to his feet--a
rugged-faced old man with long and thick white hair which fell on
his shoulders--and smiled at Marco while his eyes were still wet.
``You have passed from one country to another with the message?''
he said. ``You were under orders to say those four words?''
``Yes, Father,'' answered Marco.
``That was all? You were to say no more?''
``I know no more. Silence has been the order since I took my
oath of allegiance when I was a child. I was not old enough to
fight, or serve, or reason about great things. All I could do
was to be silent, and to train myself to remember, and be ready
when I was called. When my father saw I was ready, he trusted
me to go out and give the Sign. He told me the four words.
Nothing else.''
The old man watched him with a wondering face.
``If Stefan Loristan does not know best,'' he said, ``who does?''
``He always knows,'' answered Marco proudly. ``Always.'' He
waved his hand like a young king toward The Rat. He wanted each
man they met to understand the value of The Rat. ``He chose for
me this companion,'' he added. ``I have done nothing alone.''
``He let me call myself his aide-de-camp!'' burst forth The Rat.
``I would be cut into inch-long strips for him.''
Marco translated.
Then the priest looked at The Rat and slowly nodded his head.
``Yes,'' he said. ``He knew best. He always knows best. That I
see.''
``How did you know I was my father's son?'' asked Marco. ``You
have seen him?''
``No,'' was the answer; ``but I have seen a picture which is said
to be his image--and you are the picture's self. It is, indeed,
a strange thing that two of God's creatures should be so alike.
There is a purpose in it.'' He led them into his bare small
house and made them rest, and drink goat's milk, and eat food.
As he moved about the hut-like place, there was a mysterious and
exalted look on his face.
``You must be refreshed before we leave here,'' he said at last.
``I am going to take you to a place hidden in the mountains where
there are men whose hearts will leap at the sight of you. To see
you will give them new power and courage and new resolve. Tonight
they meet as they or their ancestors have met for
centuries, but now they are nearing the end of their waiting.
And I shall bring them the son of Stefan Loristan, who is the
Bearer of the Sign!''
They ate the bread and cheese and drank the goat's milk he gave
them, but Marco explained that they did not need rest as they had
slept all day. They were prepared to follow him when he was
ready.
The last faint hint of twilight had died into night and the stars
were at their thickest when they set out together. The
white-haired old man took a thick knotted staff in his hand and
led the way. He knew it well, though it was a rugged and steep
one with no track to mark it. Sometimes they seemed to be
walking around the mountain, sometimes they were climbing,
sometimes they dragged themselves over rocks or fallen trees, or
struggled through almost impassable thickets; more than once they
descended into ravines and, almost at the risk of their lives,
clambered and drew themselves with the aid of the undergrowth up
the other side. The Rat was called upon to use all his prowess,
and sometimes Marco and the priest helped him across obstacles
with the aid of his crutch.
``Haven't I shown to-night whether I'm a cripple or not?'' he
said once to Marco. ``You can tell HIM about this, can't you?
And that the crutches helped instead of being in the way?''
They had been out nearly two hours when they came to a place
where the undergrowth was thick and a huge tree had fallen
crashing down among it in some storm. Not far from the tree was
an outcropping rock. Only the top of it was to be seen above the
heavy tangle.
They had pushed their way through the jungle of bushes and young
saplings, led by their companion. They did not know where they
would be led next and were supposed to push forward further when
the priest stopped by the outcropping rock. He stood silent a
few minutes--quite motionless--as if he were listening to the
forest and the night. But there was utter stillness. There was
not even a breeze to stir a leaf, or a half-wakened bird to
sleepily chirp.
He struck the rock with his staff--twice, and then twice again.
Marco and The Rat stood with bated breath.
They did not wait long. Presently each of them found himself
leaning forward, staring with almost unbelieving eyes, not at the
priest or his staff, but at THE ROCK ITSELF!
It was moving! Yes, it moved. The priest stepped aside and it
slowly turned, as if worked by a lever. As it turned, it
gradually revealed a chasm of darkness dimly lighted, and the
priest spoke to Marco. ``There are hiding-places like this all
through Samavia,'' he said. ``Patience and misery have waited
long in them. They are the caverns of the Forgers of the Sword.
Come!''
XXVII
``IT IS THE LOST PRINCE! IT IS IVOR!''
Many times since their journey had begun the boys had found their
hearts beating with the thrill and excitement of things. The
story of which their lives had been a part was a pulse-quickening
experience. But as they carefully made their way down the steep
steps leading seemingly into the bowels of the earth, both Marco
and The Rat felt as though the old priest must hear the thudding
in their young sides.
`` `The Forgers of the Sword.' Remember every word they say,''
The Rat whispered, ``so that you can tell it to me afterwards.
Don't forget anything! I wish I knew Samavian.''
At the foot of the steps stood the man who was evidently the
sentinel who worked the lever that turned the rock. He was a big
burly peasant with a good watchful face, and the priest gave him
a greeting and a blessing as he took from him the lantern he held
out.
They went through a narrow and dark passage, and down some more
steps, and turned a corner into another corridor cut out of rock
and earth. It was a wider corridor, but still dark, so that
Marco and The Rat had walked some yards before their eyes became
sufficiently accustomed to the dim light to see that the walls
themselves seemed made of arms stacked closely together.
``The Forgers of the Sword!'' The Rat was unconsciously mumbling
to himself, ``The Forgers of the Sword!''
It must have taken years to cut out the rounding passage they
threaded their way through, and longer years to forge the solid,
bristling walls. But The Rat remembered the story the stranger
had told his drunken father, of the few mountain herdsmen who, in
their savage grief and wrath over the loss of their prince, had
banded themselves together with a solemn oath which had been
handed down from generation to generation. The Samavians were a
long-memoried people, and the fact that their passion must be
smothered had made it burn all the more fiercely. Five hundred
years ago they had first sworn their oath; and kings had come and
gone, had died or been murdered, and dynasties had changed, but
the Forgers of the Sword had not changed or forgotten their oath
or wavered in their belief that some time--some time, even after
the long dark years--the soul of their Lost Prince would be among
them once more, and that they would kneel at the feet and kiss
the hands of him for whose body that soul had been reborn. And
for the last hundred years their number and power and their
hiding places had so increased that Samavia was at last
honeycombed with them. And they only waited, breathless,--for
the Lighting of the Lamp.
The old priest knew how breathlessly, and he knew what he was
bringing them. Marco and The Rat, in spite of their fond boyimaginings,
were not quite old enough to know how fierce and full
of flaming eagerness the breathless waiting of savage full-grown
men could be. But there was a tense-strung thrill in knowing
that they who were being led to them were the Bearers of the
Sign. The Rat went hot and cold; he gnawed his fingers as he
went. He could almost have shrieked aloud, in the intensity of
his excitement, when the old priest stopped before a big black
door!
Marco made no sound. Excitement or danger always made him look
tall and quite pale. He looked both now.
The priest touched the door, and it opened.
They were looking into an immense cavern. Its walls and roof
were lined with arms--guns, swords, bayonets, javelins, daggers,
pistols, every weapon a desperate man might use. The place was
full of men, who turned towards the door when it opened. They
all made obeisance to the priest, but Marco realized almost at
the same instant that they started on seeing that he was not
alone.
They were a strange and picturesque crowd as they stood under
their canopy of weapons in the lurid torchlight. Marco saw at
once that they were men of all classes, though all were alike
roughly dressed. They were huge mountaineers, and plainsmen
young and mature in years. Some of the biggest were men with
white hair but with bodies of giants, and with determination in
their strong jaws. There were many of these, Marco saw, and in
each man's eyes, whether he were young or old, glowed a steady
unconquered flame. They had been beaten so often, they had been
oppressed and robbed, but in the eyes of each one was this
unconquered flame which, throughout all the long tragedy of years
had been handed down from father to son. It was this which had
gone on through centuries, keeping its oath and forging its
swords in the caverns of the earth, and which to-day
was--waiting.
The old priest laid his hand on Marco's shoulder, and gently
pushed him before him through the crowd which parted to make way
for them. He did not stop until the two stood in the very midst
of the circle, which fell back gazing wonderingly. Marco looked
up at the old man because for several seconds he did not speak.
It was plain that he did not speak because he also was excited,
and could not. He opened his lips and his voice seemed to fail
him. Then he tried again and spoke so that all could hear--even
the men at the back of the gazing circle.
``My children,'' he said, ``this is the son of Stefan Loristan,
and he comes to bear the Sign. My son,'' to Marco, ``speak!''
Then Marco understood what he wished, and also what he felt. He
felt it himself, that magnificent uplifting gladness, as he
spoke, holding his black head high and lifting his right hand.
``The Lamp is Lighted, brothers!'' he cried. ``The Lamp is
Lighted!''
Then The Rat, who stood apart, watching, thought that the strange
world within the cavern had gone mad! Wild smothered cries broke
forth, men caught each other in passionate embrace, they fell
upon their knees, they clutched one another sobbing, they wrung
each other's hands, they leaped into the air. It was as if they
could not bear the joy of hearing that the end of their waiting
had come at last. They rushed upon Marco, and fell at his feet.
The Rat saw big peasants kissing his shoes, his hands, every
scrap of his clothing they could seize. The wild circle swayed
and closed upon him until The Rat was afraid. He did not know
that, overpowered by this frenzy of emotion, his own excitement
was making him shake from head to foot like a leaf, and that
tears were streaming down his cheeks. The swaying crowd hid
Marco from him, and he began to fight his way towards him because
his excitement increased with fear. The ecstasy-frenzied crowd
of men seemed for the moment to have almost ceased to be sane.
Marco was only a boy. They did not know how fiercely they were
pressing upon him and keeping away the very air.
``Don't kill him! Don't kill him!'' yelled The Rat, struggling
forward. ``Stand back, you fools! I'm his aide-de-camp! Let me
pass!''
And though no one understood his English, one or two suddenly
remembered they had seen him enter with the priest and so gave
way. But just then the old priest lifted his hand above the
crowd, and spoke in a voice of stern command.
``Stand back, my children!'' he cried. ``Madness is not the
homage you must bring to the son of Stefan Loristan. Obey!
Obey!'' His voice had a power in it that penetrated even the
wildest herdsmen. The frenzied mass swayed back and left space
about Marco, whose face The Rat could at last see. It was very
white with emotion, and in his eyes there was a look which was
like awe.
The Rat pushed forward until he stood beside him. He did not
know that he almost sobbed as he spoke.
``I'm your aide-de-camp,'' he said. ``I'm going to stand here!
Your father sent me! I'm under orders! I thought they'd crush
you to death.''
He glared at the circle about them as if, instead of worshippers
distraught with adoration, they had been enemies. The old priest
seeing him, touched Marco's arm.
``Tell him he need not fear,'' he said. ``It was only for the
first few moments. The passion of their souls drove them wild.
They are your slaves.''
``Those at the back might have pushed the front ones on until
they trampled you under foot in spite of themselves!'' The Rat
persisted.
``No,'' said Marco. ``They would have stopped if I had spoken.''
``Why didn't you speak then?'' snapped The Rat.
``All they felt was for Samavia, and for my father,'' Marco said,
``and for the Sign. I felt as they did.''
The Rat was somewhat softened. It was true, after all. How
could he have tried to quell the outbursts of their worship of
Loristan-- of the country he was saving for them--of the Sign
which called them to freedom? He could not.
Then followed a strange and picturesque ceremonial. The priest
went about among the encircling crowd and spoke to one man after
another--sometimes to a group. A larger circle was formed. As
the pale old man moved about, The Rat felt as if some religious
ceremony were going to be performed. Watching it from first to
last, he was thrilled to the core.
At the end of the cavern a block of stone had been cut out to
look like an altar. It was covered with white, and against the
wall above it hung a large picture veiled by a curtain. From the
roof there swung before it an ancient lamp of metal suspended by
chains. In front of the altar was a sort of stone dais. There
the priest asked Marco to stand, with his aide-de-camp on the
lower level in attendance. A knot of the biggest herdsmen went
out and returned. Each carried a huge sword which had perhaps
been of the earliest made in the dark days gone by. The bearers
formed themselves into a line on either side of Marco. They
raised their swords and formed a pointed arch above his head and
a passage twelve men long. When the points first clashed
together The Rat struck himself hard upon his breast. His
exultation was too keen to endure. He gazed at Marco standing
still--in that curiously splendid way in which both he and his
father COULD stand still--and wondered how he could do it. He
looked as if he were prepared for any strange thing which could
happen to him--because he was ``under orders.'' The Rat knew
that he was doing whatsoever he did merely for his father's sake.
It was as if he felt that he was representing his father, though
he was a mere boy; and that because of this, boy as he was, he
must bear himself nobly and remain outwardly undisturbed.
At the end of the arch of swords, the old priest stood and gave a
sign to one man after another. When the sign was given to a man
he walked under the arch to the dais, and there knelt and,
lifting Marco's hand to his lips, kissed it with passionate
fervor. Then he returned to the place he had left. One after
another passed up the aisle of swords, one after another knelt,
one after the other kissed the brown young hand, rose and went
away. Sometimes The Rat heard a few words which sounded almost
like a murmured prayer, sometimes he heard a sob as a shaggy head
bent, again and again he saw eyes wet with tears. Once or twice
Marco spoke a few Samavian words, and the face of the man spoken
to flamed with joy. The Rat had time to see, as Marco had seen,
that many of the faces were not those of peasants. Some of them
were clear cut and subtle and of the type of scholars or nobles.
It took a long time for them all to kneel and kiss the lad's
hand, but no man omitted the ceremony; and when at last it was at
an end, a strange silence filled the cavern. They stood and
gazed at each other with burning eyes.
The priest moved to Marco's side, and stood near the altar. He
leaned forward and took in his hand a cord which hung from the
veiled picture--he drew it and the curtain fell apart. There
seemed to stand gazing at them from between its folds a tall
kingly youth with deep eyes in which the stars of God were stilly
shining, and with a smile wonderful to behold. Around the heavy
locks of his black hair the long dead painter of missals had set
a faint glow of light like a halo.
``Son of Stefan Loristan,'' the old priest said, in a shaken
voice, ``it is the Lost Prince! It is Ivor!''
Then every man in the room fell on his knees. Even the men who
had upheld the archway of swords dropped their weapons with a
crash and knelt also. He was their saint--this boy! Dead for
five hundred years, he was their saint still.
``Ivor! Ivor!'' the voices broke into a heavy murmur. ``Ivor!
Ivor!'' as if they chanted a litany.
Marco started forward, staring at the picture, his breath caught
in his throat, his lips apart.
``But--but--'' he stammered, ``but if my father were as young as
he is--he would be LIKE him!''
``When you are as old as he is, YOU will be like him--YOU!'' said
the priest. And he let the curtain fall.
The Rat stood staring with wide eyes from Marco to the picture
and from the picture to Marco. And he breathed faster and faster
and gnawed his finger ends. But he did not utter a word. He
could not have done it, if he tried.
Then Marco stepped down from the dais as if he were in a dream,
and the old man followed him. The men with swords sprang to
their feet and made their archway again with a new clash of
steel. The old man and the boy passed under it together. Now
every man's eyes were fixed on Marco. At the heavy door by which
he had entered, he stopped and turned to meet their glances. He
looked very young and thin and pale, but suddenly his father's
smile was lighted in his face. He said a few words in Samavian
clearly and gravely, saluted, and passed out.
``What did you say to them?'' gasped The Rat, stumbling after him
as the door closed behind them and shut in the murmur of
impassioned sound.
``There was only one thing to say,'' was the answer. ``They are
men--I am only a boy. I thanked them for my father, and told
them he would never--never forget.''
XXVIII
``EXTRA! EXTRA! EXTRA!''
It was raining in London--pouring. It had been raining for two
weeks, more or less, generally more. When the train from Dover
drew in at Charing Cross, the weather seemed suddenly to have
considered that it had so far been too lenient and must express
itself much more vigorously. So it had gathered together its
resources and poured them forth in a deluge which surprised even
Londoners.
The rain so beat against and streamed down the windows of the
third-class carriage in which Marco and The Rat sat that they
could not see through them.
They had made their homeward journey much more rapidly than they
had made the one on which they had been outward bound. It had
of course taken them some time to tramp back to the frontier, but
there had been no reason for stopping anywhere after they had
once reached the railroads. They had been tired sometimes, but
they had slept heavily on the wooden seats of the railway
carriages. Their one desire was to get home. No. 7 Philibert
Place rose before them in its noisy dinginess as the one
desirable spot on earth. To Marco it held his father. And it
was Loristan alone that The Rat saw when he thought of it.
Loristan as he would look when he saw him come into the room with
Marco, and stand up and salute, and say: ``I have brought him
back, sir. He has carried out every single order you gave
him--every single one. So have I.'' So he had. He had been
sent as his companion and attendant, and he had been faithful in
every thought. If Marco would have allowed him, he would have
waited upon him like a servant, and have been proud of the
service. But Marco would never let him forget that they were
only two boys and that one was of no more importance than the
other. He had secretly even felt this attitude to be a sort of
grievance. It would have been more like a game if one of them
had been the mere servitor of the other, and if that other had
blustered a little, and issued commands, and demanded sacrifices.
If the faithful vassal could have been wounded or cast into a
dungeon for his young commander's sake, the adventure would have
been more complete. But though their journey had been full of
wonders and rich with beauties, though the memory of it hung in
The Rat's mind like a background of tapestry embroidered in all
the hues of the earth with all the splendors of it, there had
been no dungeons and no wounds. After the adventure in Munich
their unimportant boyishness had not even been observed by such
perils as might have threatened them. As The Rat had said, they
had ``blown like grains of dust'' through Europe and had been as
nothing. And this was what Loristan had planned, this was what
his grave thought had wrought out. If they had been men, they
would not have been so safe.
From the time they had left the old priest on the hillside to
begin their journey back to the frontier, they both had been
given to long silences as they tramped side by side or lay on the
moss in the forests. Now that their work was done, a sort of
reaction had set in. There were no more plans to be made and no
more uncertainties to contemplate. They were on their way back
to No. 7 Philibert Place--Marco to his father, The Rat to the man
he worshipped. Each of them was thinking of many things. Marco
was full of longing to see his father's face and hear his voice
again. He wanted to feel the pressure of his hand on his
shoulder--to be sure that he was real and not a dream. This last
was because during this homeward journey everything that had
happened often seemed to be a dream. It had all been so
wonderful--the climber standing looking down at them the morning
they awakened on the Gaisburg; the mountaineer shoemaker
measuring his foot in the small shop; the old, old woman and her
noble lord; the Prince with his face turned upward as he stood on
the balcony looking at the moon; the old priest kneeling and
weeping for joy; the great cavern with the yellow light upon the
crowd of passionate faces; the curtain which fell apart and
showed the still eyes and the black hair with the halo about it!
Now that they were left behind, they all seemed like things he
had dreamed. But he had not dreamed them; he was going back to
tell his father about them. And how GOOD it would be to feel his
hand on his shoulder!
The Rat gnawed his finger ends a great deal. His thoughts were
more wild and feverish than Marco's. They leaped forward in
spite of him. It was no use to pull himself up and tell himself
that he was a fool. Now that all was over, he had time to be as
great a fool as he was inclined to be. But how he longed to
reach London and stand face to face with Loristan! The sign was
given. The Lamp was lighted. What would happen next? His
crutches were under his arms before the train drew up.
``We're there! We're there!'' he cried restlessly to Marco.
They had no luggage to delay them. They took their bags and
followed the crowd along the platform. The rain was rattling
like bullets against the high glassed roof. People turned to
look at Marco, seeing the glow of exultant eagerness in his face.
They thought he must be some boy coming home for the holidays and
going to make a visit at a place he delighted in. The rain was
dancing on the pavements when they reached the entrance.
``A cab won't cost much,'' Marco said, ``and it will take us
quickly.''
They called one and got into it. Each of them had flushed
cheeks, and Marco's eyes looked as if he were gazing at something
a long way off--gazing at it, and wondering.
``We've come back!'' said The Rat, in an unsteady voice. ``We've
been--and we've come back!'' Then suddenly turning to look at
Marco, ``Does it ever seem to you as if, perhaps, it--it wasn't
true?''
``Yes,'' Marco answered, ``but it was true. And it's done.''
Then he added after a second or so of silence, just what The Rat
had said to himself, ``What next?'' He said it very low.
The way to Philibert Place was not long. When they turned into
the roaring, untidy road, where the busses and drays and carts
struggled past each other with their loads, and the tired-faced
people hurried in crowds along the pavement, they looked at them
all feeling that they had left their dream far behind indeed.
But they were at home.
It was a good thing to see Lazarus open the door and stand
waiting before they had time to get out of the cab. Cabs stopped
so seldom before houses in Philibert Place that the inmates were
always prompt to open their doors. When Lazarus had seen this
one stop at the broken iron gate, he had known whom it brought.
He had kept an eye on the windows faithfully for many a day--even
when he knew that it was too soon, even if all was well, for any
travelers to return.
He bore himself with an air more than usually military and his
salute when Marco crossed the threshold was formal stateliness
itself. But his greeting burst from his heart.
``God be thanked!'' he said in his deep growl of joy. ``God be
thanked!''
When Marco put forth his hand, he bent his grizzled head and
kissed it devoutly.
``God be thanked!'' he said again.
``My father?'' Marco began, ``my father is out?'' If he had been
in the house, he knew he would not have stayed in the back
sitting-room.
``Sir,'' said Lazarus, ``will you come with me into his room?
You, too, sir,'' to The Rat. He had never said ``sir'' to him
before.
He opened the door of the familiar room, and the boys entered.
The room was empty.
Marco did not speak; neither did The Rat. They both stood still
in the middle of the shabby carpet and looked up at the old
soldier. Both had suddenly the same feeling that the earth had
dropped from beneath their feet. Lazarus saw it and spoke fast
and with tremor. He was almost as agitated as they were.
``He left me at your service--at your command''--he began.
``Left you?'' said Marco.
``He left us, all three, under orders--to WAIT,'' said Lazarus.
``The Master has gone.''
The Rat felt something hot rush into his eyes. He brushed it
away that he might look at Marco's face. The shock had changed
it very much. Its glowing eager joy had died out, it had turned
paler and his brows were drawn together. For a few seconds he
did not speak at all, and, when he did speak, The Rat knew that
his voice was steady only because he willed that it should be so.
``If he has gone,'' he said, ``it is because he had a strong
reason. It was because he also was under orders.''
``He said that you would know that,'' Lazarus answered. ``He was
called in such haste that he had not a moment in which to do more
than write a few words. He left them for you on his desk
there.''
Marco walked over to the desk and opened the envelope which was
lying there. There were only a few lines on the sheet of paper
inside and they had evidently been written in the greatest haste.
They were these:
``The Life of my life--for Samavia.''
``He was called--to Samavia,'' Marco said, and the thought sent
his blood rushing through his veins. ``He has gone to Samavia!''
Lazarus drew his hand roughly across his eyes and his voice shook
and sounded hoarse.
``There has been great disaffection in the camps of the
Maranovitch,'' he said. ``The remnant of the army has gone mad.
Sir, silence is still the order, but who knows--who knows? God
alone.''
He had not finished speaking before he turned his head as if
listening to sounds in the road. They were the kind of sounds
which had broken up The Squad, and sent it rushing down the
passage into the street to seize on a newspaper. There was to be
heard a commotion of newsboys shouting riotously some startling
piece of news which had called out an ``Extra.''
The Rat heard it first and dashed to the front door. As he
opened it a newsboy running by shouted at the topmost power of
his lungs the news he had to sell: ``Assassination of King
Michael Maranovitch by his own soldiers! Assassination of the
Maranovitch! Extra! Extra! Extra!''
When The Rat returned with a newspaper, Lazarus interposed
between him and Marco with great and respectful ceremony.
``Sir,'' he said to Marco, ``I am at your command, but the Master
left me with an order which I was to repeat to you. He requested
you NOT to read the newspapers until he himself could see you
again.''
Both boys fell back.
``Not read the papers!'' they exclaimed together.
Lazarus had never before been quite so reverential and
ceremonious.
``Your pardon, sir,'' he said. ``I may read them at your orders,
and report such things as it is well that you should know. There
have been dark tales told and there may be darker ones. He asked
that you would not read for yourself. If you meet again--when
you meet again''--he corrected himself hastily--``when you meet
again, he says you will understand. I am your servant. I will
read and answer all such questions as I can.''
The Rat handed him the paper and they returned to the back room
together.
``You shall tell us what he would wish us to hear,'' Marco said.
The news was soon told. The story was not a long one as exact
details had not yet reached London. It was briefly that the head
of the Maranovitch party had been put to death by infuriated
soldiers of his own army. It was an army drawn chiefly from a
peasantry which did not love its leaders, or wish to fight, and
suffering and brutal treatment had at last roused it to furious
revolt.
``What next?'' said Marco.
``If I were a Samavian--'' began The Rat and then he stopped.
Lazarus stood biting his lips, but staring stonily at the carpet.
Not The Rat alone but Marco also noted a grim change in him. It
was grim because it suggested that he was holding himself under
an iron control. It was as if while tortured by anxiety he had
sworn not to allow himself to look anxious and the resolve set
his jaw hard and carved new lines in his rugged face. Each boy
thought this in secret, but did not wish to put it into words.
If he was anxious, he could only be so for one reason, and each
realized what the reason must be. Loristan had gone to
Samavia--to the torn and bleeding country filled with riot and
danger. If he had gone, it could only have been because its
danger called him and he went to face it at its worst. Lazarus
had been left behind to watch over them. Silence was still the
order, and what he knew he could not tell them, and perhaps he
knew little more than that a great life might be lost.
Because his master was absent, the old soldier seemed to feel
that he must comfort himself with a greater ceremonial reverance
than he had ever shown before. He held himself within call, and
at Marco's orders, as it had been his custom to hold himself with
regard to Loristan. The ceremonious service even extended itself
to The Rat, who appeared to have taken a new place in his mind.
He also seemed now to be a person to be waited upon and replied
to with dignity and formal respect.
When the evening meal was served, Lazarus drew out Loristan's
chair at the head of the table and stood behind it with a
majestic air.
``Sir,'' he said to Marco, ``the Master requested that you take
his seat at the table until--while he is not with you.''
Marco took the seat in silence.
At two o'clock in the morning, when the roaring road was still,
the light from the street lamp, shining into the small bedroom,
fell on two pale boy faces. The Rat sat up on his sofa bed in
the old way with his hands clasped round his knees. Marco lay
flat on his hard pillow. Neither of them had been to sleep and
yet they had not talked a great deal. Each had secretly guessed
a good deal of what the other did not say.
``There is one thing we must remember,'' Marco had said, early in
the night. ``We must not be afraid.''
``No,'' answered The Rat, almost fiercely, ``we must not be
afraid.''
``We are tired; we came back expecting to be able to tell it all
to him. We have always been looking forward to that. We never
thought once that he might be gone. And he WAS gone. Did you
feel as if--'' he turned towards the sofa, ``as if something had
struck you on the chest?''
``Yes,'' The Rat answered heavily. ``Yes.''
``We weren't ready,'' said Marco. ``He had never gone before;
but we ought to have known he might some day be--called. He went
because he was called. He told us to wait. We don't know what
we are waiting for, but we know that we must not be afraid. To
let ourselves be AFRAID would be breaking the Law.''
``The Law!'' groaned The Rat, dropping his head on his hands,
``I'd forgotten about it.''
``Let us remember it,'' said Marco. ``This is the time. `Hate
not. FEAR not!' '' He repeated the last words again and again.
``Fear not! Fear not,'' he said. ``NOTHING can harm him.''
The Rat lifted his head, and looked at the bed sideways.
``Did you think--'' he said slowly--``did you EVER think that
perhaps HE knew where the descendant of the Lost Prince was?''
Marco answered even more slowly.
``If any one knew--surely he might. He has known so much,'' he
said.
``Listen to this!'' broke forth The Rat. ``I believe he has gone
to TELL the people. If he does--if he could show them--all the
country would run mad with joy. It wouldn't be only the Secret
Party. All Samavia would rise and follow any flag he chose to
raise. They've prayed for the Lost Prince for five hundred
years, and if they believed they'd got him once more, they'd
fight like madmen for him. But there would not be any one to
fight. They'd ALL want the same thing! If they could see the
man with Ivor's blood in his veins, they'd feel he had come back
to them--risen from the dead. They'd believe it!''
He beat his fists together in his frenzy of excitement. ``It's
the time! It's the time!'' he cried. ``No man could let such a
chance go by! He MUST tell them--he MUST. That MUST be what he's
gone for. He knows --he knows--he's always known!'' And he
threw himself back on his sofa and flung his arms over his face,
lying there panting.
``If it is the time,'' said Marco in a low, strained voice--``if
it is, and he knows--he will tell them.'' And he threw his arms
up over his own face and lay quite still.
Neither of them said another word, and the street lamp shone in
on them as if it were waiting for something to happen. But
nothing happened. In time they were asleep.
XXIX
'TWIXT NIGHT AND MORNING
After this, they waited. They did not know what they waited for,
nor could they guess even vaguely how the waiting would end. All
that Lazarus could tell them he told. He would have been willing
to stand respectfully for hours relating to Marco the story of
how the period of their absence had passed for his Master and
himself. He told how Loristan had spoken each day of his son,
how he had often been pale with anxiousness, how in the evenings
he had walked to and fro in his room, deep in thought, as he
looked down unseeingly at the carpet.
``He permitted me to talk of you, sir,'' Lazarus said. ``I saw
that he wished to hear your name often. I reminded him of the
times when you had been so young that most children of your age
would have been in the hands of nurses, and yet you were strong
and silent and sturdy and traveled with us as if you were not a
child at all--never crying when you were tired and were not
properly fed. As if you understood--as if you understood,'' he
added, proudly. ``If, through the power of God a creature can be
a man at six years old, you were that one. Many a dark day I
have looked into your solemn, watching eyes, and have been half
afraid; because that a child should answer one's gaze so gravely
seemed almost an unearthly thing.''
``The chief thing I remember of those days,'' said Marco, ``is
that he was with me, and that whenever I was hungry or tired, I
knew he must be, too.''
The feeling that they were ``waiting'' was so intense that it
filled the days with strangeness. When the postman's knock was
heard at the door, each of them endeavored not to start. A
letter might some day come which would tell them--they did not
know what. But no letters came. When they went out into the
streets, they found themselves hurrying on their way back in
spite of themselves. Something might have happened. Lazarus
read the papers faithfully, and in the evening told Marco and The
Rat all the news it was ``well that they should hear.'' But the
disorders of Samavia had ceased to occupy much space. They had
become an old story, and after the excitement of the
assassination of Michael Maranovitch had died out, there seemed
to be a lull in events. Michael's son had not dared to try to
take his father's place, and there were rumors that he also had
been killed. The head of the Iarovitch had declared himself king
but had not been crowned because of disorders in his own party.
The country seemed existing in a nightmare of suffering, famine
and suspense.
``Samavia is `waiting' too,'' The Rat broke forth one night as
they talked together, ``but it won't wait long--it can't. If I
were a Samavian and in Samavia--''
``My father is a Samavian and he is in Samavia,'' Marco's grave
young voice interposed. The Rat flushed red as he realized what
he had said. ``What a fool I am!'' he groaned. ``I--I beg your
pardon-- sir.'' He stood up when he said the last words and
added the ``sir'' as if he suddenly realized that there was a
distance between them which was something akin to the distance
between youth and maturity-- but yet was not the same.
``You are a good Samavian but--you forget,'' was Marco's answer.
Lazarus' intense grimness increased with each day that passed.
The ceremonious respectfulness of his manner toward Marco
increased also. It seemed as if the more anxious he felt the
more formal and stately his bearing became. It was as though he
braced his own courage by doing the smallest things life in the
back sitting- room required as if they were of the dignity of
services performed in a much larger place and under much more
imposing circumstances. The Rat found himself feeling almost as
if he were an equerry in a court, and that dignity and ceremony
were necessary on his own part. He began to experience a sense
of being somehow a person of rank, for whom doors were opened
grandly and who had vassals at his command. The watchful
obedience of fifty vassals embodied itself in the manner of
Lazarus.
``I am glad,'' The Rat said once, reflectively, ``that, after all
my father was once--different. It makes it easier to learn
things perhaps. If he had not talked to me about people
who--well, who had never seen places like Bone Court--this might
have been harder for me to understand.''
When at last they managed to call The Squad together, and went to
spend a morning at the Barracks behind the churchyard, that body
of armed men stared at their commander in great and amazed
uncertainty. They felt that something had happened to him. They
did not know what had happened, but it was some experience which
had made him mysteriously different. He did not look like Marco,
but in some extraordinary way he seemed more akin to him. They
only knew that some necessity in Loristan's affairs had taken the
two away from London and the Game. Now they had come back, and
they seemed older.
At first, The Squad felt awkward and shuffled its feet
uncomfortably. After the first greetings it did not know
exactly what to say. It was Marco who saved the situation.
``Drill us first,'' he said to The Rat, ``then we can talk about
the Game.''
`` 'Tention!'' shouted The Rat, magnificently. And then they
forgot everything else and sprang into line. After the drill was
ended, and they sat in a circle on the broken flags, the Game
became more resplendent than it had ever been.
``I've had time to read and work out new things,'' The Rat said.
``Reading is like traveling.''
Marco himself sat and listened, enthralled by the adroitness of
the imagination he displayed. Without revealing a single
dangerous fact he built up, of their journeyings and experiences,
a totally new structure of adventures which would have fired the
whole being of any group of lads. It was safe to describe places
and people, and he so described them that The Squad squirmed in
its delight at feeling itself marching in a procession attending
the Emperor in Vienna; standing in line before palaces; climbing,
with knapsacks strapped tight, up precipitous mountain roads;
defending mountain- fortresses; and storming Samavian castles.
The Squad glowed and exulted. The Rat glowed and exulted
himself. Marco watched his sharp-featured, burning-eyed face
with wonder and admiration. This strange power of making things
alive was, he knew, what his father would call ``genius.''
``Let's take the oath of 'legiance again,'' shouted Cad, when the
Game was over for the morning.
``The papers never said nothin' more about the Lost Prince, but
we are all for him yet! Let's take it!'' So they stood in line
again, Marco at the head, and renewed their oath.
``The sword in my hand--for Samavia!
``The heart in my breast--for Samavia!
``The swiftness of my sight, the thought of my brain, the life of
my life--for Samavia.
``Here grow twelve men--for Samavia.
``God be thanked!''
It was more solemn than it had been the first time. The Squad
felt it tremendously. Both Cad and Ben were conscious that
thrills ran down their spines into their boots. When Marco and
The Rat left them, they first stood at salute and then broke out
into a ringing cheer.
On their way home, The Rat asked Marco a question.
``Did you see Mrs. Beedle standing at the top of the basement
steps and looking after us when we went out this morning?''
Mrs. Beedle was the landlady of the lodgings at No. 7 Philibert
Place. She was a mysterious and dusty female, who lived in the
``cellar kitchen'' part of the house and was seldom seen by her
lodgers.
``Yes,'' answered Marco, ``I have seen her two or three times
lately, and I do not think I ever saw her before. My father has
never seen her, though Lazarus says she used to watch him round
corners. Why is she suddenly so curious about us?''
``I'd like to know,'' said The Rat. ``I've been trying to work
it out. Ever since we came back, she's been peeping round the
door of the kitchen stairs, or over balustrades, or through the
cellar- kitchen windows. I believe she wants to speak to you,
and knows Lazarus won't let her if he catches her at it. When
Lazarus is about, she always darts back.''
``What does she want to say?'' said Marco.
``I'd like to know,'' said The Rat again.
When they reached No. 7 Philibert Place, they found out, because
when the door opened they saw at the top of cellar-kitchen stairs
at the end of the passage, the mysterious Mrs. Beedle, in her
dusty black dress and with a dusty black cap on, evidently having
that minute mounted from her subterranean hiding-place. She had
come up the steps so quickly that Lazarus had not yet seen her.
``Young Master Loristan!'' she called out authoritatively.
Lazarus wheeled about fiercely.
``Silence!'' he commanded. ``How dare you address the young
Master?''
She snapped her fingers at him, and marched forward folding her
arms tightly. ``You mind your own business,'' she said. ``It's
young Master Loristan I'm speaking to, not his servant. It's
time he was talked to about this.''
``Silence, woman!'' shouted Lazarus.
``Let her speak,'' said Marco. ``I want to hear. What is it you
wish to say, Madam? My father is not here.''
``That's just what I want to find out about,'' put in the woman.
``When is he coming back?''
``I do not know,'' answered Marco.
``That's it,'' said Mrs. Beedle. ``You're old enough to
understand that two big lads and a big fellow like that can't
have food and lodgin's for nothing. You may say you don't live
high--and you don't--but lodgin's are lodgin's and rent is rent.
If your father's coming back and you can tell me when, I mayn't
be obliged to let the rooms over your heads; but I know too much
about foreigners to let bills run when they are out of sight.
Your father's out of sight. He,'' jerking her head towards
Lazarus, ``paid me for last week. How do I know he will pay me
for this week!''
``The money is ready,'' roared Lazarus.
The Rat longed to burst forth. He knew what people in Bone Court
said to a woman like that; he knew the exact words and phrases.
But they were not words and phrases an aide-de-camp might deliver
himself of in the presence of his superior officer; they were not
words and phrases an equerry uses at court. He dare not ALLOW
himself to burst forth. He stood with flaming eyes and a flaming
face, and bit his lips till they bled. He wanted to strike with
his crutches. The son of Stefan Loristan! The Bearer of the
Sign! There sprang up before his furious eyes the picture of the
luridly lighted cavern and the frenzied crowd of men kneeling at
this same boy's feet, kissing them, kissing his hands, his
garments, the very earth he stood upon, worshipping him, while
above the altar the kingly young face looked on with the nimbus
of light like a halo above it. If he dared speak his mind now,
he felt he could have endured it better. But being an
aide-de-camp he could not.
``Do you want the money now?'' asked Marco. ``It is only the
beginning of the week and we do not owe it to you until the week
is over. Is it that you want to have it now?''
Lazarus had become deadly pale. He looked huge in his fury, and
he looked dangerous.
``Young Master,'' he said slowly, in a voice as deadly as his
pallor, and he actually spoke low, ``this woman--''
Mrs. Beedle drew back towards the cellar-kitchen steps.
``There's police outside,'' she shrilled. ``Young Master
Loristan, order him to stand back.''
``No one will hurt you,'' said Marco. ``If you have the money
here, Lazarus, please give it to me.''
Lazarus literally ground his teeth. But he drew himself up and
saluted with ceremony. He put his hand in his breast pocket and
produced an old leather wallet. There were but a few coins in
it. He pointed to a gold one.
``I obey you, sir--since I must--'' he said, breathing hard.
``That one will pay her for the week.''
Marco took out the sovereign and held it out to the woman.
``You hear what he says,'' he said. ``At the end of this week if
there is not enough to pay for the next, we will go.''
Lazarus looked so like a hyena, only held back from springing by
chains of steel, that the dusty Mrs. Beedle was afraid to take
the money.
``If you say that I shall not lose it, I'll wait until the week's
ended,'' she said. ``You're nothing but a lad, but you're like
your father. You've got a way that a body can trust. If he was
here and said he hadn't the money but he'd have it in time, I'd
wait if it was for a month. He'd pay it if he said he would.
But he's gone; and two boys and a fellow like that one don't seem
much to depend on. But I'll trust YOU.''
``Be good enough to take it,'' said Marco. And he put the coin
in her hand and turned into the back sitting-room as if he did
not see her.
The Rat and Lazarus followed him.
``Is there so little money left?'' said Marco. ``We have always
had very little. When we had less than usual, we lived in poorer
places and were hungry if it was necessary. We know how to go
hungry. One does not die of it.''
The big eyes under Lazarus' beetling brows filled with tears.
``No, sir,'' he said, ``one does not die of hunger. But the
insult --the insult! That is not endurable.''
``She would not have spoken if my father had been here,'' Marco
said. ``And it is true that boys like us have no money. Is
there enough to pay for another week?''
``Yes, sir,'' answered Lazarus, swallowing hard as if he had a
lump in his throat, ``perhaps enough for two--if we eat but
little. If--if the Master would accept money from those who
would give it, he would alway have had enough. But how could
such a one as he? How could he? When he went away, he
thought--he thought that --'' but there he stopped himself
suddenly.
``Never mind,'' said Marco. ``Never mind. We will go away the
day we can pay no more.''
``I can go out and sell newspapers,'' said The Rat's sharp voice.
``I've done it before. Crutches help you to sell them. The
platform would sell 'em faster still. I'll go out on the
platform.''
``I can sell newspapers, too,'' said Marco.
Lazarus uttered an exclamation like a groan.
``Sir,'' he cried, ``no, no! Am I not here to go out and look
for work? I can carry loads. I can run errands.''
``We will all three begin to see what we can do,'' Marco said.
Then--exactly as had happened on the day of their return from
their journey--there arose in the road outside the sound of
newsboys shouting. This time the outcry seemed even more excited
than before. The boys were running and yelling and there seemed
more of them than usual. And above all other words was heard
``Samavia! Samavia!'' But to-day The Rat did not rush to the
door at the first cry. He stood still--for several seconds they
all three stood still --listening. Afterwards each one
remembered and told the others that he had stood still because
some strange, strong feeling held him WAITING as if to hear some
great thing.
It was Lazarus who went out of the room first and The Rat and
Marco followed him.
One of the upstairs lodgers had run down in haste and opened the
door to buy newspapers and ask questions. The newsboys were wild
with excitement and danced about as they shouted. The piece of
news they were yelling had evidently a popular quality.
The lodger bought two papers and was handing out coppers to a lad
who was talking loud and fast.
``Here's a go!'' he was saying. ``A Secret Party's risen up and
taken Samavia! 'Twixt night and mornin' they done it! That
there Lost Prince descendant 'as turned up, an' they've CROWNED
him--'twixt night and mornin' they done it! Clapt 'is crown on
'is 'ead, so's they'd lose no time.'' And off he bolted,
shouting, `` 'Cendant of Lost Prince! 'Cendant of Lost Prince
made King of Samavia!''
It was then that Lazarus, forgetting even ceremony, bolted also.
He bolted back to the sitting-room, rushed in, and the door fell
to behind him.
Marco and The Rat found it shut when, having secured a newspaper,
they went down the passage. At the closed door, Marco stopped.
He did not turn the handle. From the inside of the room there
came the sound of big convulsive sobs and passionate Samavian
words of prayer and worshipping gratitude.
``Let us wait,'' Marco said, trembling a little. ``He will not
want any one to see him. Let us wait.''
His black pits of eyes looked immense, and he stood at his
tallest, but he was trembling slightly from head to foot. The
Rat had begun to shake, as if from an ague. His face was
scarcely human in its fierce unboyish emotion.
``Marco! Marco!'' his whisper was a cry. ``That was what he
went for--BECAUSE HE KNEW!''
``Yes,'' answered Marco, ``that was what he went for.'' And his
voice was unsteady, as his body was.
Presently the sobs inside the room choked themselves back
suddenly. Lazarus had remembered. They had guessed he had been
leaning against the wall during his outburst. Now it was evident
that he stood upright, probably shocked at the forgetfulness of
his frenzy.
So Marco turned the handle of the door and went into the room.
He shut the door behind him, and they all three stood together.
When the Samavian gives way to his emotions, he is emotional
indeed. Lazarus looked as if a storm had swept over him. He had
choked back his sobs, but tears still swept down his cheeks.
``Sir,'' he said hoarsely, ``your pardon! It was as if a
convulsion seized me. I forgot everything--even my duty.
Pardon, pardon!'' And there on the worn carpet of the dingy back
sitting-room in the Marylebone Road, he actually went on one knee
and kissed the boy's hand with adoration.
``You mustn't ask pardon,'' said Marco. ``You have waited so
long, good friend. You have given your life as my father has.
You have known all the suffering a boy has not lived long enough
to understand. Your big heart--your faithful heart--'' his voice
broke and he stood and looked at him with an appeal which seemed
to ask him to remember his boyhood and understand the rest.
``Don't kneel,'' he said next. ``You mustn't kneel.'' And
Lazarus, kissing his hand again, rose to his feet.
``Now--we shall HEAR!'' said Marco. ``Now the waiting will soon
be over.''
``Yes, sir. Now, we shall receive commands!'' Lazarus answered.
The Rat held out the newspapers.
``May we read them yet?'' he asked.
``Until further orders, sir,'' said Lazarus hurriedly and
apologetically --``until further orders, it is still better that
I should read them first.''
XXX
THE GAME IS AT AN END
So long as the history of Europe is written and read, the
unparalleled story of the Rising of the Secret Party in Samavia
will stand out as one of its most startling and romantic records.
Every detail connected with the astonishing episode, from
beginning to end, was romantic even when it was most productive
of realistic results. When it is related, it always begins with
the story of the tall and kingly Samavian youth who walked out of
the palace in the early morning sunshine singing the herdsmen's
song of beauty of old days. Then comes the outbreak of the
ruined and revolting populace; then the legend of the morning on
the mountain side, and the old shepherd coming out of his cave
and finding the apparently dead body of the beautiful young
hunter. Then the secret nursing in the cavern; then the jolting
cart piled with sheepskins crossing the frontier, and ending its
journey at the barred entrance of the monastery and leaving its
mysterious burden behind. And then the bitter hate and struggle
of dynasties, and the handful of shepherds and herdsmen meeting
in their cavern and binding themselves and their unborn sons and
sons' sons by an oath never to be broken. Then the passing of
generations and the slaughter of peoples and the changing of
kings,--and always that oath remembered, and the Forgers of the
Sword, at their secret work, hidden in forests and caves. Then
the strange story of the uncrowned kings who, wandering in other
lands, lived and died in silence and seclusion, often laboring
with their hands for their daily bread, but never forgetting that
they must be kings, and ready,--even though Samavia never called.
Perhaps the whole story would fill too many volumes to admit of
it ever being told fully.
But history makes the growing of the Secret Party clear,--though
it seems almost to cease to be history, in spite of its efforts
to be brief and speak only of dull facts, when it is forced to
deal with the Bearing of the Sign by two mere boys, who, being
blown as unremarked as any two grains of dust across Europe, lit
the Lamp whose flame so flared up to the high heavens that as if
from the earth itself there sprang forth Samavians by the
thousands ready to feed it-- Iarovitch and Maranovitch swept
aside forever and only Samavians remaining to cry aloud in ardent
praise and worship of the God who had brought back to them their
Lost Prince. The battle-cry of his name had ended every battle.
Swords fell from hands because swords were not needed. The
Iarovitch fled in terror and dismay; the Maranovitch were nowhere
to be found. Between night and morning, as the newsboy had said,
the standard of Ivor was raised and waved from palace and citadel
alike. From mountain, forest and plain, from city, village and
town, its followers flocked to swear allegiance; broken and
wounded legions staggered along the roads to join and kneel to
it; women and children followed, weeping with joy and chanting
songs of praise. The Powers held out their scepters to the
lately prostrate and ignored country. Train-loads of food and
supplies of all things needed began to cross the frontier; the
aid of nations was bestowed. Samavia, at peace to till its land,
to raise its flocks, to mine its ores, would be able to pay all
back. Samavia in past centuries had been rich enough to make
great loans, and had stored such harvests as warring countries
had been glad to call upon. The story of the crowning of the
King had been the wildest of all--the multitude of ecstatic
people, famished, in rags, and many of them weak with wounds,
kneeling at his feet, praying, as their one salvation and
security, that he would go attended by them to their bombarded
and broken cathedral, and at its high altar let the crown be
placed upon his head, so that even those who perhaps must die of
their past sufferings would at least have paid their poor homage
to the King Ivor who would rule their children and bring back to
Samavia her honor and her peace.
``Ivor! Ivor!'' they chanted like a prayer,--``Ivor! Ivor!'' in
their houses, by the roadside, in the streets.
``The story of the Coronation in the shattered Cathedral, whose
roof had been torn to fragments by bombs,'' said an important
London paper, ``reads like a legend of the Middle Ages. But,
upon the whole, there is in Samavia's national character,
something of the mediaeval, still.''
Lazarus, having bought and read in his top floor room every
newspaper recording the details which had reached London,
returned to report almost verbatim, standing erect before Marco,
the eyes under his shaggy brows sometimes flaming with
exultation, sometimes filled with a rush of tears. He could not
be made to sit down. His whole big body seemed to have become
rigid with magnificence. Meeting Mrs. Beedle in the passage, he
strode by her with an air so thunderous that she turned and
scuttled back to her cellar kitchen, almost falling down the
stone steps in her nervous terror. In such a mood, he was not a
person to face without something like awe.
In the middle of the night, The Rat suddenly spoke to Marco as if
he knew that he was awake and would hear him.
``He has given all his life to Samavia!'' he said. ``When you
traveled from country to country, and lived in holes and corners,
it was because by doing it he could escape spies, and see the
people who must be made to understand. No one else could have
made them listen. An emperor would have begun to listen when he
had seen his face and heard his voice. And he could be silent,
and wait for the right time to speak. He could keep still when
other men could not. He could keep his face still--and his
hands--and his eyes. Now all Samavia knows what he has done, and
that he has been the greatest patriot in the world. We both saw
what Samavians were like that night in the cavern. They will go
mad with joy when they see his face!''
``They have seen it now,'' said Marco, in a low voice from his
bed.
Then there was a long silence, though it was not quite silence
because The Rat's breathing was so quick and hard.
``He--must have been at that coronation!'' he said at last.
``The King--what will the King do to--repay him?''
Marco did not answer. His breathing could be heard also. His
mind was picturing that same coronation--the shattered, roofless
cathedral, the ruins of the ancient and magnificent high altar,
the multitude of kneeling, famine-scourged people, the
battle-worn, wounded and bandaged soldiery! And the King! And
his father! Where had his father stood when the King was
crowned? Surely, he had stood at the King's right hand, and the
people had adored and acclaimed them equally!
``King Ivor!'' he murmured as if he were in a dream. ``King
Ivor!''
The Rat started up on his elbow.
``You will see him,'' he cried out. ``He's not a dream any
longer. The Game is not a game now--and it is ended--it is won!
It was real--HE was real! Marco, I don't believe you hear.''
``Yes, I do,'' answered Marco, ``but it is almost more a dream
than when it was one.''
``The greatest patriot in the world is like a king himself!''
raved The Rat. ``If there is no bigger honor to give him, he
will be made a prince--and Commander-in-Chief--and Prime
Minister! Can't you hear those Samavians shouting, and singing,
and praying? You'll see it all! Do you remember the mountain
climber who was going to save the shoes he made for the Bearer of
the Sign? He said a great day might come when one could show
them to the people. It's come! He'll show them! I know how
they'll take it!'' His voice suddenly dropped--as if it dropped
into a pit. ``You'll see it all. But I shall not.''
Then Marco awoke from his dream and lifted his head. ``Why
not?'' he demanded. It sounded like a demand.
``Because I know better than to expect it!'' The Rat groaned.
``You've taken me a long way, but you can't take me to the palace
of a king. I'm not such a fool as to think that, even of your
father--''
He broke off because Marco did more than lift his head. He sat
upright.
``You bore the Sign as much as I did,'' he said. ``We bore it
together.''
``Who would have listened to ME?'' cried The Rat. ``YOU were the
son of Stefan Loristan.''
``You were the friend of his son,'' answered Marco. ``You went
at the command of Stefan Loristan. You were the ARMY of the son
of Stefan Loristan. That I have told you. Where I go, you will
go. We will say no more of this--not one word.''
And he lay down again in the silence of a prince of the blood.
And The Rat knew that he meant what he said, and that Stefan
Loristan also would mean it. And because he was a boy, he began
to wonder what Mrs. Beedle would do when she heard what had
happened--what had been happening all the time a tall, shabby
``foreigner'' had lived in her dingy back sitting-room, and been
closely watched lest he should go away without paying his rent,
as shabby foreigners sometimes did. The Rat saw himself managing
to poise himself very erect on his crutches while he told her
that the shabby foreigner was--well, was at least the friend of a
King, and had given him his crown--and would be made a prince and
a Commander-in-Chief--and a Prime Minister--because there was no
higher rank or honor to give him. And his son--whom she had
insulted-- was Samavia's idol because he had borne the Sign. And
also that if she were in Samavia, and Marco chose to do it he
could batter her wretched lodging-house to the ground and put her
in a prison--``and serve her jolly well right!''
The next day passed, and the next; and then there came a letter.
It was from Loristan, and Marco turned pale when Lazarus handed
it to him. Lazarus and The Rat went out of the room at once, and
left him to read it alone. It was evidently not a long letter,
because it was not many minutes before Marco called them again
into the room.
``In a few days, messengers--friends of my father's--will come to
take us to Samavia. You and I and Lazarus are to go,'' he said
to The Rat.
``God be thanked!'' said Lazarus. ``God be thanked!''
Before the messengers came, it was the end of the week. Lazarus
had packed their few belongings, and on Saturday Mrs. Beedle was
to be seen hovering at the top of the celler steps, when Marco
and The Rat left the back sitting-room to go out.
``You needn't glare at me!'' she said to Lazarus, who stood
glowering at the door which he had opened for them. ``Young
Master Loristan, I want to know if you've heard when your father
is coming back?''
``He will not come back,'' said Marco.
``He won't, won't he? Well, how about next week's rent?'' said
Mrs. Beedle. ``Your man's been packing up, I notice. He's not
got much to carry away, but it won't pass through that front door
until I've got what's owing me. People that can pack easy think
they can get away easy, and they'll bear watching. The week's up
to-day.''
Lazarus wheeled and faced her with a furious gesture. ``Get back
to your cellar, woman,'' he commanded. ``Get back under ground
and stay there. Look at what is stopping before your miserable
gate.''
A carriage was stopping--a very perfect carriage of dark brown.
The coachman and footman wore dark brown and gold liveries, and
the footman had leaped down and opened the door with respectful
alacrity. ``They are friends of the Master's come to pay their
respects to his son,'' said Lazarus. ``Are their eyes to be
offended by the sight of you?''
``Your money is safe,'' said Marco. ``You had better leave us.''
Mrs. Beedle gave a sharp glance at the two gentlemen who had
entered the broken gate. They were of an order which did not
belong to Philibert Place. They looked as if the carriage and
the dark brown and gold liveries were every-day affairs to them.
``At all events, they're two grown men, and not two boys without
a penny,'' she said. ``If they're your father's friends, they'll
tell me whether my rent's safe or not.''
The two visitors were upon the threshold. They were both men of
a certain self-contained dignity of type; and when Lazarus opened
wide the door, they stepped into the shabby entrance hall as if
they did not see it. They looked past its dinginess, and past
Lazarus, and The Rat, and Mrs. Beedle--THROUGH them, as it
were,--at Marco.
He advanced towards them at once.
``You come from my father!'' he said, and gave his hand first to
the elder man, then to the younger.
``Yes, we come from your father. I am Baron Rastka--and this is
the Count Vorversk,'' said the elder man, bowing.
``If they're barons and counts, and friends of your father's,
they are well-to-do enough to be responsible for you,'' said Mrs.
Beedle, rather fiercely, because she was somewhat over-awed and
resented the fact. ``It's a matter of next week's rent,
gentlemen. I want to know where it's coming from.''
The elder man looked at her with a swift cold glance. He did not
speak to her, but to Lazarus. ``What is she doing here?'' he
demanded.
Marco answered him. ``She is afraid we cannot pay our rent,'' he
said. ``It is of great importance to her that she should be
sure.''
``Take her away,'' said the gentleman to Lazarus. He did not
even glance at her. He drew something from his coat-pocket and
handed it to the old soldier. ``Take her away,'' he repeated.
And because it seemed as if she were not any longer a person at
all, Mrs. Beedle actually shuffled down the passage to the
cellar-kitchen steps. Lazarus did not leave her until he, too,
had descended into the cellar kitchen, where he stood and towered
above her like an infuriated giant.
``To-morrow he will be on his way to Samavia, miserable woman!''
he said. ``Before he goes, it would be well for you to implore
his pardon.''
But Mrs. Beedle's point of view was not his. She had recovered
some of her breath.
``I don't know where Samavia is,'' she raged, as she struggled to
set her dusty, black cap straight. ``I'll warrant it's one of
these little foreign countries you can scarcely see on the
map--and not a decent English town in it! He can go as soon as
he likes, so long as he pays his rent before he does it.
Samavia, indeed! You talk as if he was Buckingham Palace!''
XXXI
``THE SON OF STEFAN LORISTAN ''
When a party composed of two boys attended by a big soldierly
man-servant and accompanied by two distinguished-looking, elderly
men, of a marked foreign type, appeared on the platform of
Charing Cross Station they attracted a good deal of attention.
In fact, the good looks and strong, well-carried body of the
handsome lad with the thick black hair would have caused eyes to
turn towards him even if he had not seemed to be regarded as so
special a charge by those who were with him. But in a country
where people are accustomed to seeing a certain manner and
certain forms observed in the case of persons--however young--who
are set apart by the fortune of rank and distinction, and where
the populace also rather enjoys the sight of such demeanor, it
was inevitable that more than one quick-sighted looker-on should
comment on the fact that this was not an ordinary group of
individuals.
``See that fine, big lad over there!'' said a workman, whose
head, with a pipe in its mouth, stuck out of a third-class
smoking carriage window. ``He's some sort of a young swell, I'll
lay a shillin'! Take a look at him,'' to his mate inside.
The mate took a look. The pair were of the decent, polytechniceducated
type, and were shrewd at observation.
``Yes, he's some sort of young swell,'' he summed him up. ``But
he's not English by a long chalk. He must be a young Turk, or
Russian, sent over to be educated. His suite looks like it. All
but the ferret-faced chap on crutches. Wonder what he is!''
A good-natured looking guard was passing, and the first man
hailed him.
``Have we got any swells traveling with us this morning?'' he
asked, jerking his head towards the group. ``That looks like it.
Any one leaving Windsor or Sandringham to cross from Dover
to-day?''
The man looked at the group curiously for a moment and then shook
his head.
``They do look like something or other,'' he answered, ``but no
one knows anything about them. Everybody's safe in Buckingham
Palace and Marlborough House this week. No one either going or
coming.''
No observer, it is true, could have mistaken Lazarus for an
ordinary attendant escorting an ordinary charge. If silence had
not still been strictly the order, he could not have restrained
himself. As it was, he bore himself like a grenadier, and stood
by Marco as if across his dead body alone could any one approach
the lad.
``Until we reach Melzarr,'' he had said with passion to the two
gentlemen,--``until I can stand before my Master and behold him
embrace his son--BEHOLD him--I implore that I may not lose sight
of him night or day. On my knees, I implore that I may travel,
armed, at his side. I am but his servant, and have no right to
occupy a place in the same carriage. But put me anywhere. I
will be deaf, dumb, blind to all but himself. Only permit me to
be near enough to give my life if it is needed. Let me say to
my Master, `I never left him.' ''
``We will find a place for you,'' the elder man said, ``and if
you are so anxious, you may sleep across his threshold when we
spend the night at a hotel.''
``I will not sleep!'' said Lazarus. ``I will watch. Suppose
there should be demons of Maranovitch loose and infuriated in
Europe? Who knows!''
``The Maranovitch and Iarovitch who have not already sworn
allegiance to King Ivor are dead on battlefields. The remainder
are now Fedorovitch and praising God for their King,'' was the
answer Baron Rastka made him.
But Lazarus kept his guard unbroken. When he occupied the next
compartment to the one in which Marco traveled, he stood in the
corridor throughout the journey. When they descended at any
point to change trains, he followed close at the boy's heels, his
fierce eyes on every side at once and his hand on the weapon
hidden in his broad leather belt. When they stopped to rest in
some city, he planted himself in a chair by the bedroom door of
his charge, and if he slept he was not aware that nature had
betrayed him into doing so.
If the journey made by the young Bearers of the Sign had been a
strange one, this was strange by its very contrast. Throughout
that pilgrimage, two uncared-for waifs in worn clothes had
traveled from one place to another, sometimes in third- or
fourth-class continental railroad carriages, sometimes in jolting
diligences, sometimes in peasants' carts, sometimes on foot by
side roads and mountain paths, and forest ways. Now, two
well-dressed boys in the charge of two men of the class whose
orders are obeyed, journeyed in compartments reserved for them,
their traveling appurtenances supplying every comfort that luxury
could provide.
The Rat had not known that there were people who traveled in such
a manner; that wants could be so perfectly foreseen; that
railroad officials, porters at stations, the staff of
restaurants, could be by magic transformed into active and eager
servants. To lean against the upholstered back of a railway
carriage and in luxurious ease look through the window at passing
beauties, and then to find books at your elbow and excellent
meals appearing at regular hours, these unknown perfections made
it necessary for him at times to pull himself together and give
all his energies to believing that he was quite awake. Awake he
was, and with much on his mind ``to work out,''--so much, indeed,
that on the first day of the journey he had decided to give up
the struggle, and wait until fate made clear to him such things
as he was to be allowed to understand of the mystery of Stefan
Loristan.
What he realized most clearly was that the fact that the son of
Stefan Loristan was being escorted in private state to the
country his father had given his life's work to, was never for a
moment forgotten. The Baron Rastka and Count Vorversk were of
the dignity and courteous reserve which marks men of distinction.
Marco was not a mere boy to them, he was the son of Stefan
Loristan; and they were Samavians. They watched over him, not as
Lazarus did, but with a gravity and forethought which somehow
seemed to encircle him with a rampart. Without any air of
subservience, they constituted themselves his attendants. His
comfort, his pleasure, even his entertainment, were their private
care. The Rat felt sure they intended that, if possible, he
should enjoy his journey, and that he should not be fatigued by
it. They conversed with him as The Rat had not known that men
ever conversed with boys,--until he had met Loristan. It was
plain that they knew what he would be most interested in, and
that they were aware he was as familiar with the history of
Samavia as they were themselves. When he showed a disposition to
hear of events which had occurred, they were as prompt to follow
his lead as they would have been to follow the lead of a man.
That, The Rat argued with himself, was because Marco had lived so
intimately with his father that his life had been more like a
man's than a boy's and had trained him in mature thinking. He
was very quiet during the journey, and The Rat knew he was
thinking all the time.
The night before they reached Melzarr, they slept at a town some
hours distant from the capital. They arrived at midnight and
went to a quiet hotel.
``To-morrow,'' said Marco, when The Rat had left him for the
night, ``to-morrow, we shall see him! God be thanked!''
``God be thanked!'' said The Rat, also. And each saluted the
other before they parted.
In the morning, Lazarus came into the bedroom with an air so
solemn that it seemed as if the garments he carried in his hands
were part of some religious ceremony.
``I am at your command, sir,'' he said. ``And I bring you your
uniform.''
He carried, in fact, a richly decorated Samavian uniform, and the
first thing Marco had seen when he entered was that Lazarus
himself was in uniform also. His was the uniform of an officer
of the King's Body Guard.
``The Master,'' he said, ``asks that you wear this on your
entrance to Melzarr. I have a uniform, also, for your
aide-de-camp.''
When Rastka and Vorversk appeared, they were in uniforms also.
It was a uniform which had a touch of the Orient in its
picturesque splendor. A short fur-bordered mantle hung by a
jeweled chain from the shoulders, and there was much magnificent
embroidery of color and gold.
``Sir, we must drive quickly to the station,'' Baron Rastka said
to Marco. ``These people are excitable and patriotic, and His
Majesty wishes us to remain incognito, and avoid all chance of
public demonstration until we reach the capital.'' They passed
rather hurriedly through the hotel to the carriage which awaited
them. The Rat saw that something unusual was happening in the
place. Servants were scurrying round corners, and guests were
coming out of their rooms and even hanging over the balustrades.
As Marco got into his carriage, he caught sight of a boy about
his own age who was peeping from behind a bush. Suddenly he
darted away, and they all saw him tearing down the street towards
the station as fast as his legs would carry him.
But the horses were faster than he was. The party reached the
station, and was escorted quickly to its place in a special
saloon- carriage which awaited it. As the train made its way out
of the station, Marco saw the boy who had run before them rush on
to the platform, waving his arms and shouting something with wild
delight. The people who were standing about turned to look at
him, and the next instant they had all torn off their caps and
thrown them up in the air and were shouting also. But it was not
possible to hear what they said.
``We were only just in time,'' said Vorversk, and Baron Rastka
nodded.
The train went swiftly, and stopped only once before they reached
Melzarr. This was at a small station, on the platform of which
stood peasants with big baskets of garlanded flowers and
evergreens. They put them on the train, and soon both Marco and
The Rat saw that something unusual was taking place. At one
time, a man standing on the narrow outside platform of the
carriage was plainly seen to be securing garlands and handing up
flags to men who worked on the roof.
``They are doing something with Samavian flags and a lot of
flowers and green things!'' cried The Rat, in excitement.
``Sir, they are decorating the outside of the carriage,''
Vorversk said. ``The villagers on the line obtained permission
from His Majesty. The son of Stefan Loristan could not be
allowed to pass their homes without their doing homage.''
``I understand,'' said Marco, his heart thumping hard against his
uniform. ``It is for my father's sake.''
At last, embowered, garlanded, and hung with waving banners, the
train drew in at the chief station at Melzarr.
``Sir,'' said Rastka, as they were entering, ``will you stand up
that the people may see you? Those on the outskirts of the crowd
will have the merest glimpse, but they will never forget.''
Marco stood up. The others grouped themselves behind him. There
arose a roar of voices, which ended almost in a shriek of joy
which was like the shriek of a tempest. Then there burst forth
the blare of brazen instruments playing the National Hymn of
Samavia, and mad voices joined in it.
If Marco had not been a strong boy, and long trained in selfcontrol,
what he saw and heard might have been almost too much to
be borne. When the train had come to a full stop, and the door
was thrown open, even Rastka's dignified voice was unsteady as he
said, ``Sir, lead the way. It is for us to follow.''
And Marco, erect in the doorway, stood for a moment, looking out
upon the roaring, acclaiming, weeping, singing and swaying
multitude-- and saluted just as he had saluted The Squad, looking
just as much a boy, just as much a man, just as much a thrilling
young human being.
Then, at the sight of him standing so, it seemed as if the crowd
went mad--as the Forgers of the Sword had seemed to go mad on the
night in the cavern. The tumult rose and rose, the crowd rocked,
and leapt, and, in its frenzy of emotion, threatened to crush
itself to death. But for the lines of soldiers, there would have
seemed no chance for any one to pass through it alive.
``I am the son of Stefan Loristan,'' Marco said to himself, in
order to hold himself steady. ``I am on my way to my father.''
Afterward, he was moving through the line of guarding soldiers to
the entrance, where two great state-carriages stood; and there,
outside, waited even a huger and more frenzied crowd than that
left behind. He saluted there again, and again, and again, on
all sides. It was what they had seen the Emperor do in Vienna.
He was not an Emperor, but he was the son of Stefan Loristan who
had brought back the King.
``You must salute, too,'' he said to The Rat, when they got into
the state carriage. ``Perhaps my father has told them. It seems
as if they knew you.''
The Rat had been placed beside him on the carriage seat. He was
inwardly shuddering with a rapture of exultation which was almost
anguish. The people were looking at him--shouting at him--surely
it seemed like it when he looked at the faces nearest in the
crowd. Perhaps Loristan--
``Listen!'' said Marco suddenly, as the carriage rolled on its
way. ``They are shouting to us in Samavian, `The Bearers of the
Sign!'
That is what they are saying now. `The Bearers of the Sign.' ''
They were being taken to the Palace. That Baron Rastka and Count
Vorversk had explained in the train. His Majesty wished to
receive them. Stefan Loristan was there also.
The city had once been noble and majestic. It was somewhat
Oriental, as its uniforms and national costumes were. There were
domed and pillared structures of white stone and marble, there
were great arches, and city gates, and churches. But many of
them were half in ruins through war, and neglect, and decay.
They passed the half-unroofed cathedral, standing in the sunshine
in its great square, still in all its disaster one of the most
beautiful structures in Europe. In the exultant crowd were still
to be seen haggard faces, men with bandaged limbs and heads or
hobbling on sticks and crutches. The richly colored native
costumes were most of them worn to rags. But their wearers had
the faces of creatures plucked from despair to be lifted to
heaven.
``Ivor! Ivor!'' they cried; ``Ivor! Ivor!'' and sobbed with
rapture.
The Palace was as wonderful in its way as the white cathedral.
The immensely wide steps of marble were guarded by soldiers. The
huge square in which it stood was filled with people whom the
soldiers held in check.
``I am his son,'' Marco said to himself, as he descended from the
state carriage and began to walk up the steps which seemed so
enormously wide that they appeared almost like a street. Up he
mounted, step by step, The Rat following him. And as he turned
from side to side, to salute those who made deep obeisance as he
passed, he began to realize that he had seen their faces before.
``These who are guarding the steps,'' he said, quickly under his
breath to The Rat, ``are the Forgers of the Sword!''
There were rich uniforms everywhere when he entered the palace,
and people who bowed almost to the ground as he passed. He was
very young to be confronted with such an adoring adulation and
royal ceremony; but he hoped it would not last too long, and that
after he had knelt to the King and kissed his hand, he would see
his father and hear his voice. Just to hear his voice again, and
feel his hand on his shoulder!
Through the vaulted corridors, to the wide-opened doors of a
magnificent room he was led at last. The end of it seemed a long
way off as he entered. There were many richly dressed people who
stood in line as he passed up toward the canopied dais. He felt
that he had grown pale with the strain of excitement, and he had
begun to feel that he must be walking in a dream, as on each side
people bowed low and curtsied to the ground.
He realized vaguely that the King himself was standing, awaiting
his approach. But as he advanced, each step bearing him nearer
to the throne, the light and color about him, the strangeness and
magnificence, the wildly joyous acclamation of the populace
outside the palace, made him feel rather dazzled, and he did not
clearly see any one single face or thing.
``His Majesty awaits you,'' said a voice behind him which seemed
to be Baron Rastka's. ``Are you faint, sir? You look pale.''
He drew himself together, and lifted his eyes. For one full
moment, after he had so lifted them, he stood quite still and
straight, looking into the deep beauty of the royal face. Then
he knelt and kissed the hands held out to him--kissed them both
with a passion of boy love and worship.
The King had the eyes he had longed to see--the King's hands were
those he had longed to feel again upon his shoulder--the King was
his father! the ``Stefan Loristan'' who had been the last of
those who had waited and labored for Samavia through five hundred
years, and who had lived and died kings, though none of them till
now had worn a crown!
His father was the King!
It was not that night, nor the next, nor for many nights that the
telling of the story was completed. The people knew that their
King and his son were rarely separated from each other; that the
Prince's suite of apartments were connected by a private passage
with his father's. The two were bound together by an affection
of singular strength and meaning, and their love for their people
added to their feeling for each other. In the history of what
their past had been, there was a romance which swelled the
emotional Samavian heart near to bursting. By mountain fires, in
huts, under the stars, in fields and in forests, all that was
known of their story was told and retold a thousand times, with
sobs of joy and prayer breaking in upon the tale.
But none knew it as it was told in a certain quiet but stately
room in the palace, where the man once known only as ``Stefan
Loristan,'' but whom history would call the first King Ivor of
Samavia, told his share of it to the boy whom Samavians had a
strange and superstitious worship for, because he seemed so
surely their Lost Prince restored in body and soul--almost the
kingly lad in the ancient portrait--some of them half believed
when he stood in the sunshine, with the halo about his head.
It was a wonderful and intense story, that of the long wanderings
and the close hiding of the dangerous secret. Among all those
who had known that a man who was an impassioned patriot was
laboring for Samavia, and using all the power of a great mind and
the delicate ingenuity of a great genius to gain friends and
favor for his unhappy country, there had been but one who had
known that Stefan Loristan had a claim to the Samavian throne.
He had made no claim, he had sought--not a crown--but the final
freedom of the nation for which his love had been a religion.
``Not the crown!'' he said to the two young Bearers of the Sign
as they sat at his feet like schoolboys--``not a throne. `The
Life of my life--for Samavia.' That was what I worked for--what
we have all worked for. If there had risen a wiser man in
Samavia's time of need, it would not have been for me to remind
them of their Lost Prince. I could have stood aside. But no man
arose. The crucial moment came--and the one man who knew the
secret, revealed it. Then--Samavia called, and I answered.''
He put his hand on the thick, black hair of his boy's head.
``There was a thing we never spoke of together,'' he said. ``I
believed always that your mother died of her bitter fears for me
and the unending strain of them. She was very young and loving,
and knew that there was no day when we parted that we were sure
of seeing each other alive again. When she died, she begged me
to promise that your boyhood and youth should not be burdened by
the knowledge she had found it so terrible to bear. I should
have kept the secret from you, even if she had not so implored
me. I had never meant that you should know the truth until you
were a man. If I had died, a certain document would have been
sent to you which would have left my task in your hands and made
my plans clear. You would have known then that you also were a
Prince Ivor, who must take up his country's burden and be ready
when Samavia called. I tried to help you to train yourself for
any task. You never failed me.''
``Your Majesty,'' said The Rat, ``I began to work it out, and
think it must be true that night when we were with the old woman
on the top of the mountain. It was the way she looked at--at His
Highness.''
``Say `Marco,' '' threw in Prince Ivor. ``It's easier. He was
my army, Father.''
Stefan Loristan's grave eyes melted.
``Say `Marco,' '' he said. ``You were his army--and more--when
we both needed one. It was you who invented the Game!''
``Thanks, Your Majesty,'' said The Rat, reddening scarlet. ``You
do me great honor! But he would never let me wait on him when we
were traveling. He said we were nothing but two boys. I suppose
that's why it's hard to remember, at first. But my mind went on
working until sometimes I was afraid I might let something out at
the wrong time. When we went down into the cavern, and I saw the
Forgers of the Sword go mad over him--I KNEW it must be true.
But I didn't dare to speak. I knew you meant us to wait; so I
waited.''
``You are a faithful friend,'' said the King, ``and you have
always obeyed orders!''
A great moon was sailing in the sky that night--just such a moon
as had sailed among the torn rifts of storm clouds when the
Prince at Vienna had come out upon the balcony and the boyish
voice had startled him from the darkness of the garden below.
The clearer light of this night's splendor drew them out on a
balcony also--a broad balcony of white marble which looked like
snow. The pure radiance fell upon all they saw spread before
them--the lovely but half-ruined city, the great palace square
with its broken statues and arches, the splendid ghost of the
unroofed cathedral whose High Altar was bare to the sky.
They stood and looked at it. There was a stillness in which all
the world might have ceased breathing.
``What next?'' said Prince Ivor, at last speaking quietly and
low. ``What next, Father?''
``Great things which will come, one by one,'' said the King, ``if
we hold ourselves ready.''
Prince Ivor turned his face from the lovely, white, broken city,
and put his brown hand on his father's arm.
``Upon the ledge that night--'' he said, ``Father, you remember
--?'' The King was looking far away, but he bent his head:
``Yes. That will come, too,'' he said. ``Can you repeat it?''
``Yes,'' said Ivor, ``and so can the aide-de-camp. We've said it
a hundred times. We believe it's true. `If the descendant of
the Lost Prince is brought back to rule in Samavia, he will teach
his people the Law of the One, from his throne. He will teach
his son, and that son will teach his son, and he will teach his.
And through such as these, the whole world will learn the Order
and the Law.' ''