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Show &SI0V BIRMINGHAM " dapyircrtr t tosis-fffx&a; ra WNU Service. CHAPTER XIX Continued . 26 "And I think," 1 said, "that you icarcely do Justice to the courage vl.ich our younger clergy undoubtedly lossess. , A man who would face a Mothers' union two days in a week ind would take charge of a Girls' friendly society for an outing in the 'ountry, must be daring enough for my adventure. "No curate," said Cable sullenly, 'would venture to marry a princess." "Do you happen to know our patrl-irch?" patrl-irch?" said the king. "No, I thought lot. You wouldn't talk that way ibout curates if you did. I assure ou, Mr. Cable, that our patriarch iould do anything. Wouldn't he, Cas-niir?" Cas-niir?" "lie 'dares do oil that may become i man.' " said Casimir. " 'Approach hou like the rugged Russian bear, lie armed rhinoceros, or ' " "Your patriarch," said Cable, "Isn't i curate." "But he was once," said the king. 'He must have been, though before ny time, of course. They all begin ly being curates. And I assure you le wouldn't have hesitated except or moral reasons, of course to marry wo or three princesses, and their iiothers, who would be queens, if he'd vnnted to. When I tell you that our intrlaroh has often gone for me with-iut with-iut a sign of nervousness, and used unguage you'd scarcely believe over iome trumpery little affair about a ;lrl and that was when I was a king, in absolute monarch, remember, with in army and all that sort of thing. o, there's no use saying that the ilergy daren't do tilings." The discussion was degenerating into i wrangle of purely academic inter-st. inter-st. It was Troyte who brought us ill back to the business on hand. "The real question," he said, "is not lnit a curate or a bishop might do, nit what has actually happened since lie er the fugitives reached Lystria. sent a telegram to the patriarch say-ng say-ng that the man was an impostor. He rarely wouldn't go on with the mar-inpe mar-inpe after that." "Curate or no," said Cable, "I hope :he patriarch lias shot him." "He lies," said Casimir, "in durance ri'.e. This very morning I received 'rum the patriarch a telegram " lie produced it from his pocket. The dug translated it for us. It told us :lmt Tummy had been put under arrest. ar-rest. "That Is perhaps the best thing A'hlrh could have happened," said 1'rnyte. lint it was, even on his showing, a very had best. The situation in Lys-' Mil was extremely critical. A revo-utlon, revo-utlon, carefully planned and organ-zed, organ-zed, had actually taken place. The nitriarch and the nobles, the only )cople who counted in Lystria, were lerfectly determined . to have a king (f their own seated on the historic lirone of Wladislaws the Hunter, the ""tinder of the Lystrian dynasty, famous n thousand years ago for his (Kill in killing hours. They wanted place on somebody's head the silver-k'ill silver-k'ill lillct which lliat monarch had bequeathed be-queathed to his successors. Hut IT iliev did anything of the sort every Halkun slate would mobilize at once a in I nothing could avert a war unless England recognized the new king mid deelareJ herself ready to support lihn. That, and the benevolent neutrality neu-trality of France, might save the silu-tttloti. silu-tttloti. Hut how could F.ngland recognize recog-nize a revolution which had either put it" king on the throne or set up some Imp issible person like Ftnily's curate? Troyte explained all that to us, slowly and carefully. "lint I thought," said Cable, "that mi'il squared the League of Nations and all that lot." Troyte objected to the word 'squared." 1 dare say the League of Nations would have objected to it too. 'Iia( he had done, so he said, was to 'rcme an atmosphere favorable to the f'Misidcnition of the claims of an English Eng-lish king to the Lyslrian throne. "Meaning Lord .Norheys?'' said I'ubie. Troyte nodded. lie certainly hail Dot meant his "atmosphere" to e:i-U'lop e:i-U'lop Kniily's curate. "In my opinion," said the kin.:, "the ''''st thing for us to do is to leine tliin;.:s as they are." "Surely," I said, "not exactly as "'' tile. That curate belongs more or loss to my siMer L'mily and she's hem on finding him. There II be a '''ishtt'u! row if she discovers him lying a dungeon in l.yst r,a." "Xoi'ody need ever kuow," said t'slih. "The Kngilsh I arty who r.'v.nnpnniod t'lf'U." said the king, "must be aware f the fucts, and if I judge her cliar-eier cliar-eier correct iy. she will certainly tell 'hut che knows." "Wh'H F.ngllsh lady?" said Cah.e. "Her mm'-?," said the king. Church, Miss Church, and unless I'm mistaken about her " "If Janet Church Is there," I said, "she's certain to have telegraphed to every ambassador in Europe and also to the prime minister and the leader of the Labor party and all the different differ-ent Liberal parties there are, demanding demand-ing the instant release of Emily's curate." "What I want to know," said Cable, "Is what's going to happen about my oil concession?" Nobody could give him any information informa-tion about that. It had not been granted by the Megalian government. Indeed, It had not been granted by anybody. All Cable really had in writing was a promise that It would be granted by the king of Lystria when he was safe on the throne. "That," said King Wladislaws, "is why I say that things had better be, left as they are." "But they can't," I said. "Emily's curate can't be left In prison. You don't know my sister Emily or you wouldn't suggest It. Besides, there's Janet Church to be reckoned with." "I think," said the king, "that by this time the young man has probably been released, perhaps married, possibly pos-sibly even crowned." "Good G d !" said Troyte. "You don't mean to say you actually think" The king waved his hand cheerfully. "The patriarch," he said, "is a man of unbounded patriotism, devoted to the cause of Lystrian Independence. HIP "He Lies," Said Casimir, "In Durance Vile. This Very Morning I Received From the Patriarch a Telegram." And he dislikes, Intensely dislikes, the archimandrite of Megalia. The Lystrian Lys-trian nobility wish for a king, an English Eng-lish king, a sportsman." "Emily's curate seems to be that," I said. "My daughter " said the king. "I am now speaking very confidentially my daughter rather liked that young man. I liked him myself. Casimir liked him. Everyone liked him. My daughter's only objection to marrying him was the existence of a certain Miss Temple. Now it appears that in bis case there is no Miss Temple. It is likely I do not say certain, but very likely that Calypso will insist on the patriarch releasing him. She may even suggest that the marriage should take place at once." Then Norheys slid back the door which divided the compartment from the corridor. "Thought I'd look In," he said, "just to see how you're getting on. Viola has dropped off Into a doze, and I was feeling a hit hipped with no one to talk to." lie looked around with an amiable smile, as if he were sure of a warm welcome, lie got nothing of the sort. Troyte ami Cable scowled at him. The king regarded him as an inconvenient outsider. I lo. ked the oilier way. Casimir was the only one who spl-:e. lie quoied Shakespeare in alii;si..ii to Lady Norheys' doze: Sleep Unit knits up the ravell d sleave "Hit it in one." said 'i'ii.s. settling set-tling down hetuem Cable ar.d the kill--. "Weil. Y ?' Ned. s-':ie-i up the aaairs of raiern li u :'o; e V" "No." said '! l"'. to. "W. ..." said ..rheys. - ,, r. t u ante an-te eiiio in. (i.vi't " k:a. . 1 ! a;e fell. o s ho she. e llear . a ;'s in hen rot S!-:i. "hat I ji !:. sax- is t lis : A n ordinary sort of j. ):... with no particular brains and that kind ..f tiling .often ft lb. r th.u:-h yon don't expect hiai to. Thai's v hy I'm ottering lo I'.eip. li s. ems to nir the position Is this you'll pi,!; n-o up I If Tiu vri.n' about tacts, in.at oi Uncle Ned? I'm often a bit weak on facts." "Facts' in this cae." I Bald, "re much more like fancies." "That's just where I come In," said Norheys. "A fact might have knocked me out, but when It comes to fancies, I'm there all the time. Well now, these Lystrian johnnies seem to want a king. Don't see why they do my self; but there It Is. They've got a princess, but that doesn't satisfy them." "It doesn't satisfy the League of Nations," Na-tions," said the king, "or the Entente powers. That's where the trouble Is. The Lystrlans would be quite satisfied satis-fied with Calypso. In fact, they'd be very glad to have me back again, all of thera except the patriarch. But the Entente powers simply won't stand me." "That comes to exactly the same thing as what I said," said Norheys. "Well, along comes some fellow we don't know, dropping like what-d'you-call-him from the thing-a-me-bob. What?" "A deus ex ruarhina," I suggested. "That's not what I meant." said Norheys. "I meant a jolly old bolt from the blue. But whatever we call him, thunderbolt or little tin god. there lie is, quite ready to take on the job, princess and all. That's the way things stand, isn't it, Uncle Ned?" Troyte was looking out of the window. win-dow. Casimir murmured something about a Daniel coining to judgment. Norheys went on : "Well, then, why not let him? That's what I always say: If there's a fellow who'll buck In where wanted, then let him buck In; so long as he doesn't Interfere with us." . "Unfortunately," said Troyte coldly, "you've left out of consideration the League of Nations and the treaty of Versailles, and the policy of the Allied Al-lied Powers." "What I say about all that," said Norheys, "is this : What did we fight the war for? I don't know, of course, not so to speak out of my own inside. I just fought because all the other fellows I knew did too. But I do know what you said at the time, Uncle Ned, and It's no use your saying you didn't, for you did. What we fought for was the self-determination of small nationalities. nation-alities. Well, there yen are, and you can't go back on it now. Lystria Is a small nationality, isn't it?" "Two and a half millions before the war," said the king. "Probably about two millions now." "Couldn't possibly have a smaller nationality," said Norheys, "and what I always say Is this. Uncle Ned: If you've said a thing, you've jolly well got to stick to it, even if you wish you'd said something else, which of course everybody generally does." I felt quite sorry for Troyte. He really did talk about small nationalities nationali-ties and self-determination several times during the later years of the war. I dare say he deserved to be twitted with It. But I felt I must speak a word for him. "You forget," I said to Norheys, "that you also fought to make the world safe for democracy. Setting up an absolute monarch in Lystria is not democracy." "Wlteu I talk about democracy," said Norheys, "or rather when other fellows like you, Uncle Bill, talk about democracy for it's a thing I never mention myself either in a club or anywhere any-where else I always say that the Qrst thing is to settle: What is democracy?" dem-ocracy?" We all felt, I think, that Norheys had better be left to answer his own question. Troyte, I know, distrusts the American formula "By, with, for, to, at, in, the people." None of the rest of us had a formula at all. "Democracy," said Norheys, "simply means being able to say, 'You go to h 1' to any fellow who tries to come it over on you. That's my idea of democracy, ard you may say what you like. Uncle F.:!. that's what most of us jolly well fought for. Though what I always say is tills : We were rather let down in the end. Still there is, don't you know, a sacred principle and all that, the sort of thing no decent fellow ever goes back on." "The Lystrians," I said, "are evidently evi-dently out-and-out democrats. 'You go to h 1' seems exactly to describe their attitude toward the rest of Europe." Eu-rope." "Well, then, there yon are," said Norheys. "And if you're there, what's the use of worrying?" The attendant from the restaurant car came along and told us that luncheon was served. Norheys rushed off lo waken Viola. The rest of us staggered along the swaying corridor. Troyle's forehead was lined with a deep frown, always a sign that he was engaged in serious thought. I remembered exactly the same wrinkles when he was bothered over (he writing writ-ing of Creek iambics at school, whi.-h, were considered in our day a necessary neces-sary part of the education of an Eng lisb gentleman. (To id-: reNTiNi'Kh ) |
