THE KING’S VETO
The Marquis de Lutera was a heavy sleeper, and for some time had been
growing stouter than was advisable for the dignity of a Prime Minister.
He had been defeated of late years in one or two important measures;
and his colleague, Carl Pérousse, had by gradual degrees succeeded in
worming himself into such close connection with the rest of the members
of the Cabinet, that he, Lutera, felt himself being edged out, not only
from political ‘deals,’ but from the profits appertaining thereto. So,
growing somewhat indifferent, as well as disgusted at the course affairs
were taking, he had made up his mind to retire from office, as soon as
he had carried through a certain Bill which, in its results, would have
the effect of crippling the people of the country, while helping on his
own interests to a considerable degree. At the immediate moment he had
a chance of looming large on the political horizon. Carl Pérousse could
not do anything of very great importance without him; they were both
too deeply involved together in the same schemes. In point of fact, if
Pérousse could bring the Premier to a fall, the Premier could do the
same by Pérousse. The two depended on each other; and Lutera, conscious
that if Pérousse gained any fresh accession of power, it would be to
his, Lutera’s, advantage, was gradually preparing to gracefully resign
his position in the younger and more ambitious man’s favour. But he was
not altogether comfortable in his mind since his last interview with the
King. The King had shown unusual signs of self-will and obstinacy.
He had presumed to give a command affecting the national policy; and,
moreover, he had threatened, if his command were not obeyed, to address
Parliament himself on the subject in hand, from the Throne. Such an
unaccustomed, unconstitutional idea was very upsetting to the Premier’s
mind. It had cost him a sleepless night; and when he woke to a new day’s
work, he was in an extremely irritable humour. He was doubtful how to
act;--for to complain of the King would not do; and to enlighten the
members of the Cabinet as to his Majesty’s declared determination to
dispose amicably of certain difficulties with a foreign power, which
the Ministry had fully purposed fanning up into a flame of war, might
possibly awaken a storm of dissension and discussion.
“We all want money!” said the Marquis gloomily, as he rose from his
tumbled bed to take his first breakfast, and read his early morning
letters--“And to crush a small and insolent race, whose country is rich
in mineral product, is simply the act of squeezing an orange for
the necessary juice. Life would be lost, of course, but we are
over-populated; and a good war would rid the country of many scamps
and vagabonds. Widows and orphans could be provided for by national
subscriptions, invested as the Ministry think fit, and paid to
applicants after about twenty years’ waiting!” He smiled sardonically.
“The gain to ourselves would be incalculable; new wealth, new schemes,
new openings for commerce and speculation in every way! And now the King
sets himself up as an obstacle to progress! If he were fond of money, we
could explain the whole big combine, and offer him a share;--but with
a character such as he possesses, I doubt if it would work! With some
monarchs whom I could name, it would be perfectly easy. And yet,--for
the three years he has been on the throne, he has been passive
enough,--asking no questions,--signing such documents as he has been
told to sign,--uttering such speeches as have been written for him,--and
I was never more shocked and taken aback in my life than yesterday
morning, when he declared he had decided to think and act for himself!
Simply preposterous! An ordinary man who presumes to think and act for
himself is always a danger to the community--but a king! Good Heavens!
We should have the old feudal system back again.”
He sipped his coffee leisurely, and opened a few letters; there were
none of very pressing importance. He was just about to glance through
the morning’s newspaper, when his man-servant entered bearing a note
marked ‘Private and Immediate.’ He recognized the handwriting of David
Jost.
“Anyone waiting for an answer?” he enquired.
“No, Excellency.”
The man retired. The Marquis broke the large splotchy seal bearing the
coat-of-arms which Jost affected, but to which he had no more right than
the man in the moon, and read what seemed to him more inexplicable than
the most confusing conundrum ever invented.
“MY DEAR MARQUIS,--I received your confidential messenger last night,
and explained the entire situation. He left for Moscow this morning, but
will warn us of any further developments. Sorry matters look so grave
for you. Should like a few minutes private chat when you can spare the
time.--
“Yours truly, DAVID JOST.”
Over and over again the Marquis read this brief note, staring at its
every word and utterly unable to understand its meaning.
“What in the world is the fellow driving at!” he exclaimed angrily--“‘My
messenger’! ‘Explained the entire situation’! The devil! ‘Left for
Moscow’! Upon my soul, this is maddening!” And he rang the bell sharply.
“Who brought this note?” he asked, as his servant entered.
“Mr. Jost’s own man, Excellency.”
“Has he gone?”
“Yes, Excellency.”
“Wait!” And sitting down he wrote hastily the following lines:
“DEAR SIR,--Your letter is inexplicable. I sent no messenger to you last
night. If you have any explanation to offer, I shall be disengaged and
alone till 11.30 this morning.
“Yours truly,--DE LUTERA.”
Folding, sealing, and addressing this, he marked it ‘Private’ and gave
it to his man.
“Take this yourself,” he said, “and put it into Mr. Jost’s own hands.
Trust no one to deliver it. Ask to see him personally, and then give it
to him. You understand?”
“Yes, Excellency.”
His note thus despatched, the Marquis threw himself down in his
arm-chair, and again read Jost’s mysterious communication.
“Whatever messenger has passed himself off as coming from me, Jost must
have been crazy to receive him without credentials,” he said. “There
must be a mistake somewhere!”
A vague alarm troubled him; he was not moved by conscientious scruples,
but the idea that any of his secret moves should be ‘explained’ to a
stranger was, to say the least of it, annoying, and not conducive to
the tranquillity of his mind. A thousand awkward possibilities suggested
themselves at once to his brain, and as he carried a somewhat excitable
disposition under his heavy and phlegmatic exterior, he fumed and
fretted himself for the next half hour into an impatience which only
found vent in the prosaic and everyday performance of dressing himself.
Ah!--if those who consider a Prime Minister great and exalted, could
only see him as he pulls on his trousers, and fastens his shirt collar,
what a disillusion would be promptly effected! Especially if, like
the Marquis de Lutera, he happened to be over-stout, and difficult to
clothe! This particular example of Premiership was an ungainly man; his
proud position could not make him handsome, nor lend true dignity to his
deportment. Old Mother Nature has a way of marking her specimens, if we
will learn to recognize the signs she sets on certain particular ‘makes’
of man. The Marquis de Lutera was ‘made’ to be a stock-jobber, not a
statesman. His bent was towards the material gain and good of himself,
more than the advantage of his country. His reasoning was a slight
variation of Falstaff’s logical misprisal of honour. He argued; “If I
am poor, then what is it to me that others are rich? If I am neglected,
what do I care that the people are prosperous? Let me but secure and
keep those certain millions of money which shall ensure to me and my
heritage a handsome endowment, not only for my life, but for all
lives connected with mine which come after me,--and my ‘patriotism’ is
satisfied!”
He had just finished insinuating himself by degrees into his morning
coat, when his servant entered.
“Well!” he asked impatiently.
“Mr. Jost is coming round at once, Excellency. He ordered his carriage
directly he read your note.”
“He sent no answer?”
“None, Excellency.”
“When he arrives, show him into the library.”
“Yes, Excellency.”
The Marquis thereupon left his sleeping apartment, and descended to the
library himself. The sun was streaming brilliantly into the room, and
the windows, thrown wide open, showed a cheerful display of lawn and
flower-garden, filled with palms and other semi-tropical shrubs, for
though the Premier’s house was in the centre of the fashionable quarter
of the city, it had the advantage of extensive and well-shaded grounds.
A law had been passed in the late King’s time against the felling of
trees, it having been scientifically proved that trees in a certain
quantity, not only purify the air from disease germs affecting the human
organization, but also save the crops from many noxious insect-pests and
poisonous fungi. Having learned the lesson at last, that the Almighty
may be trusted to know His own business, and that trees are intended for
wider purposes than mere timber, the regulations were strict concerning
them. No one could fell a tree on his own ground without, first of all,
making a statement at the National Office of Aboriculture as to
the causes for its removal; and only if these causes were found
satisfactory, could a stamped permission be obtained for cutting it down
or ‘lifting’ it to other ground. The result of this sensible regulation
was that in the hottest days of summer the city was kept cool and shady
by the rich foliage branching out everywhere, and in some parts running
into broad avenues and groves of great thickness and beauty. The Marquis
de Lutera’s garden had an additional charm in a beautiful alley of
orange trees, and the fragrance wafted into his room from the delicious
blossoms would have refreshed and charmed anyone less troubled, worried
and feverish, than he was at the time. But this morning the very
sunshine annoyed him;--never a great lover of Nature, the trees and
flowers forming the outlook on which his heavy eyes rested were almost
an affront. The tranquil beauty of an ever renewed and renewing
Nature is always particularly offensive to an uneasy conscience and an
exhausted mind.
The sound of wheels grinding along the outer drive brought a faint gleam
of satisfaction on his brooding features, and he turned sharply
round, as the door of the library was thrown open to admit Jost, whose
appearance, despite his jaunty manner, betokened evident confusion and
alarm.
“Good-morning, Mr. Jost!” said the Marquis stiffly, as his confidential
man ushered in the visitor,--then when the servant had retired and
closed the door, he added quickly--“Now what does this mean?”
Jost dropped into a chair, and pulling out a handkerchief wiped the
perspiration from his brow.
“I don’t know!” he said helplessly; “I don’t know what it means! I have
told you the truth! A man came to see me late last night, saying he was
sent by you on urgent business. He said you wished me to explain the
position we held, and the amount of the interests we had at stake, as
there were grave discoveries pending, and complexities likely to ensue.
He gave his name--there is his card!”
And with a semi-groan, he threw down the bit of pasteboard in question.
The Marquis snatched it up.
“‘Pasquin Leroy’! I never heard the name in my life,” he said fiercely.
“Jost, you have been done! You mean to tell me you were such a fool as
to trust an entire stranger with the whole financial plan of campaign,
and that you were credulous enough to believe that he came from
me--me--De Lutera,--without any credentials?”
“Credentials!” exclaimed Jost; “Do you suppose I would have received him
at all had credentials been lacking? Not I! He brought me the most sure
and confidential sign of your trust that could be produced--your own
signet-ring!”
The Marquis staggered back, as though Jost’s words had been so many
direct blows on the chest,--his countenance turned a livid white.
“My signet-ring!” he repeated,--and almost unconsciously he looked at
the hand from which the great jewel was missing; “My signet!”--Then he
forced a smile--“Jost, I repeat, you have been done!--doubly fooled!--no
one could possibly have obtained my signet,--for at this very moment it
is on the hand of the King!”
Jost rose slowly out of his chair, his eyes protruding out of his head,
his jaw almost dropping in the extremity of his amazement.
“The King!”--he gasped--“The King!”
“Yes, man, the King!” repeated De Lutera impatiently,--“Only yesterday
morning his Majesty, having mislaid his own ring for the moment,
borrowed mine just before starting on his yachting cruise. How you
stare! You have been fooled!--that is perfectly plain and evident!”
“The King!” repeated Jost stupidly--“Then the man who came to me last
night--” He broke off, unable to find any words for the expression of
the thoughts which began to terrify him.
“Well!--the man who came to you last night,” echoed the Marquis,--“He
was not the King, I suppose, was he?” And he laughed derisively.
“No--he was not the King,” said Jost slowly; “I know _him_ well enough!
But it might have been someone in the King’s service! For he knew, or
said he knew, the King’s intentions in a certain matter affecting both
you and Carl Pérousse,--and in a more distant way, myself--and warned
me of a coming change in the policy. Ah!--it is now your turn to stare,
Marquis! You had best be on your guard, for if the person who came to me
last night was not your messenger, he was the King’s spy! And, in that
case, we are lost!”
The Marquis paced the room with long uneven strides,--his mind was
greatly agitated, but he had no wish to show his perturbation too openly
to one whom he considered as a mere tool in his service.
“I know,” went on Jost emphatically, “that the ring he wore was yours! I
noticed it particularly while I was talking to him. It would take a long
time and exceptional skill to make any imitation of that sapphire. There
is no doubt that it was your signet!”
The Premier halted suddenly in his nervous walk.
“You told him the whole scheme, you say?”
“I did.”
“And his reply?”
“Was, that the King had discovered it, and proposed insisting on an
enquiry.”
“And then?”
“Well! Then he warned me to look out for myself,--as anyone connected
with Carl Pérousse’s financial deal would inevitably be ruined during
the next few weeks.”
“Who is going to work the ruin?” asked the Marquis with a sneer; “Do you
not know that if the King dared to give an opinion on a national crisis,
he would be dethroned?”
“There are the People--” began Jost.
“The People! Human emmets--born for crushing under the heel of power!
A couple of ‘leaders’ in your paper, Jost, can guide the fool-mob any
way!”
“That depends!” said Jost hesitatingly; “If what the fellow said last
night be true--”
“It is not true!” said the Premier authoritatively. “We are going on
in precisely the same course as originally arranged. Neither King
nor People can interfere! Go home, and write an article about love of
country, Jost! You look in the humour for it!”
The Jew’s expression was anything but amiable.
“What is to be done about last night?” he asked sullenly.
“Nothing at present. I am going to the palace at two o’clock--I shall
see the King, and find out whether my signet is lost, stolen or strayed.
Meanwhile, keep your own counsel! If you have been betrayed into giving
your confidence to a spy in the foreign service, as I imagine--(for the
King has never employed a spy, and is not likely to do so), and he makes
known his information, it can be officially denied. The official denial
of a Government, Jost, like charity, has before now covered a multitude
of sins!”
An instinctive disinclination for further conversation brought the
interview between them abruptly to a close, and Jost, full of a
suspicious alarm, which he was ashamed to confess, drove off to his
newspaper offices. The Premier, meantime, though harassed by secret
anxiety, managed to display his usual frigid equanimity, when, after
Jost’s departure, his private secretary arrived at the customary time,
to transact under his orders the correspondence and business of the day.
This secretary, Eugène Silvano by name, was a quiet self-contained young
man, highly ambitious, and keenly interested in the political situation,
and, though in the Premier’s service, not altogether of his way of
thinking. He called the Marquis’s attention now to a letter that
had missed careful reading on the previous day. It was from the
Vicar-General of the Society of Jesus, expressing surprise and
indignation that the King should have refused the Society’s request for
such land as was required to be devoted to religious and educational
purposes, and begging that the Premier would exert his influence with
the monarch to persuade him to withdraw or mitigate his refusal.
“I can do nothing;” said the Marquis irritably,--“the lands they want
belong to the Crown. The King can dispose of them as he thinks best.”
The secretary set the letter aside.
“Shall I reply to that effect?” he enquired.
The Marquis nodded.
“I know,” said Silvano presently with a slight hesitation, “that you
never pay any attention to anonymous communications. Otherwise, there is
one here which might merit consideration.”
“What does it concern?”
“A revolutionary meeting,” replied Silvano, “where it appears the woman,
Lotys, is to speak.”
The Premier shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “You must enlighten me!
Who is the woman Lotys?”
“Ah, that no one exactly knows!” replied the secretary. “A
strange character, without doubt, but--” He paused and spoke more
emphatically--“She has power!”
Lutera gave a gesture of irritation.
“Bah! Over whom does she exercise it. Over one man or many?”
“Over one half the population at least,” responded Silvano, quietly,
turning over a few papers without looking up.
The Marquis stared at him, slightly amused.
“Have you taken statistics of the lady’s followers,” he asked; “Are you
one of them yourself?”
Silvano raised his eyes,--clear dark eyes, deep-set and steady in their
glance.
“Were I so, I should not be here;” he replied--“But I know how she
speaks; I know what she does! and from a purely political point of view
I think it unwise to ignore her.”
“What is this anonymous communication you speak of?” asked the Premier,
after a pause.
“Oh, it is brief enough,” answered Silvano unfolding a paper, and he
read aloud:
“To the Marquis de Lutera, Premier.
“Satisfy yourself that those who meet on Saturday night where Lotys
speaks, have already decided on your downfall!”
“Oracular!” said the Marquis carelessly;--“To decide is one thing--to
fulfil the decision is another! Lotys, whoever she may be, can preach
to her heart’s content, for all I care! I am rather surprised, Silvano,
that a man of your penetration and intelligence should attach any
importance to revolutionary meetings, which are always going on more
or less in every city under the sun. Why, it was but the other day,
the police were sent to disperse a crowd which had gathered round the
fanatic, Sergius Thord; only the people had sufficient sense to disperse
themselves. A street-preacher or woman ranter is like a cheap-jack or
a dispenser of quack medicines;--the mob gathers to such persons out of
curiosity, not conviction.”
The secretary made no reply, and went on with other matters awaiting his
attention.
At a few minutes before two o’clock the Marquis entered his carriage,
and was driven to the palace. There he learned that the King was
receiving, more or less unofficially, certain foreign ambassadors and
noblemen of repute in the Throne-room. A fine band was playing military
music in the great open quadrangle in front of the palace, where pillars
of rose-marble, straight as the stems of pine-trees, held up fabulous
heraldic griffins, clasping between their paws the country’s shield.
Flags were flying,--fountains flashing,--gay costumes gleamed here and
there,--and the atmosphere was full of brilliancy and gaiety,--yet the
Marquis, on his way to the audience-chamber, was rendered uncomfortably
aware of one of those mysterious impressions which are sometimes
conveyed to us, we know not how, but which tend to prepare us for
surprise and disappointment. Some extra fibre of sensitiveness in his
nervous organization was acutely touched, for he actually fancied he saw
slighting and indifferent looks on the faces of the various flunkeys and
retainers who bowed him along the different passages, or ushered him up
the state stairway, when--as a matter of fact,--all was precisely the
same as usual, and it was only his own conscience that gave imaginary
hints of change. Arrived at the ante-chamber to the Throne-room, he was
surprised to find Prince Humphry there, talking animatedly to the King’s
physician, Professor Von Glauben. The Prince seemed unusually excited;
his face was flushed, and his eyes extraordinarily brilliant, and as
he saw the Premier, he came forward, extending his hand, and almost
preventing Lutera’s profound bow and deferential salutation.
“Have you business with the King, Marquis?” enquired the young man
with a light laugh. “If you have, you must do as I am doing,--wait his
Majesty’s pleasure!”
The Premier lifted his eyebrows, smiled deprecatingly, and murmuring
something about pressure of State affairs, shook hands with Von Glauben,
whose countenance, as usual, presented an impenetrable mask to his
thoughts.
“It is rather a new experience for me,” continued the Prince, “to
be treated as a kind of petitioner on the King’s favour, and kept in
attendance,--but no matter!--novelty is always pleasing! I have been
cooling my heels here for more than an hour. Von Glauben, too, has been
waiting;--contrary to custom, he has not even been permitted to enquire
after his Majesty’s health this morning!”
Lutera maintained his former expression of polite surprise, but said
nothing. Instinct warned him to be sparing of words lest he should
betray his own private anxiety.
The Prince went on carelessly.
“Majesty takes humours like other men, and must, more than other men, I
suppose, be humoured! Yet there is to my mind something unnatural in a
system which causes several human beings to be dependent on another’s
caprice!”
“You will not say so, Sir, when you yourself are King,” observed the
Marquis.
“Long distant be the day!” returned the Prince. “Indeed, I hope it may
never be! I would rather be the simplest peasant ploughing the fields,
and happy in my own way, than suffer the penalties and pains surrounding
the possession of a Throne!”
“Only,” put in Von Glauben sententiously, “you would have to take into
consideration, Sir, whether the peasant ploughing the fields is happy
in his own way. I have made ‘the peasant ploughing the fields’ a special
form of study,--and I have always found him a remarkably discontented,
often ill-fed--and therefore unhealthy individual.”
“We are all discontented, if it comes to that!” said Prince Humphry with
a light laugh,--“Except myself! I am perfectly contented!”
“You have reason to be, Sir,” said Lutera, bowing low.
“You are quite right, Marquis!--I have! More reason than perhaps you are
aware of!”
His eyes lightened and flashed; he looked unusually handsome, and
the Premier’s shifty glance rested on him for a moment with a certain
curiosity. But he had not been accustomed to pay very much attention to
the words or actions of the Heir-Apparent, considering him to be a very
‘ordinary’ young man, without either the brilliancy or the ambition
which should mark him out as worthy of his exalted station. And before
any further conversation could take place, Sir Roger de Launay entered
the room and announced to the Marquis that the King was ready to receive
him. Prince Humphry turning sharply round, faced the equerry.
“I am still to wait?” he enquired, with a slight touch of hauteur.
Sir Roger bowed respectfully.
“Your instant desire to see the King, your father, Sir, was communicated
to his Majesty at once,” he replied. “The present delay is by his
Majesty’s own orders. I much regret----”
“Regret nothing, my dear Sir Roger,” he said. “My patience does not
easily tire! Marquis, I trust your business will not take long?”
“I shall endeavour to make it as brief as possible, Sir,” replied the
Premier deferentially as he withdrew.
It was with a certain uneasiness, however, in his mind that he followed
Sir Roger to the Throne-room. There was no possibility of exchanging so
much as a word with the equerry; besides, De Launay was not a talking
man. Passing between the lines of attendants, pages, lords-in-waiting
and others, he was conscious of a certain loss of his usual
self-possession as he found himself at last in the presence of the
King,--who, attired in brilliant uniform, was conversing graciously
and familiarly with a select group of distinguished individuals whose
costume betokened them as envoys or visitors from foreign courts in the
diplomatic service. Perceiving the Premier, however, he paused in his
conversation, and standing quite still awaited his approach. Then he
extended his hand, with his usual kindly condescension. Instinctively
Lutera’s eyes searched that hand, with the expression of a guilty
soul searching for a witness to its innocence. There shone the great
sapphire--his own signet--and to his excited fancy its blue glimmer
emitted a witch-like glow of menace. Meanwhile the King was speaking.
“You are just a few minutes late, Marquis!” he said; “Had you come
a little earlier, you would have met M. Pérousse, who has matters of
import to discuss with you.” Here he moved aside from those immediately
in hearing. “It is perhaps as well you should know I have ‘vetoed’
his war propositions. It will rest now with you, to call a Council
to-morrow,--the next day,--or,--when you please!”
Completely taken aback, the Premier was silent for a moment, biting his
lips to keep down the torrent of rage and disappointment that threatened
to break out in violent and unguarded speech.
“Sir!--Your Majesty! Pardon me, but surely you cannot fail to understand
that in a Constitution like ours, the course decided upon by Ministers
_cannot_ be vetoed by the King?”
The monarch smiled gravely.
“‘Cannot’ is a weak word, Marquis! I do not include it in my vocabulary!
I fully grant you that a plan of campaign decided upon by Ministers as
you say, has _not_ been ‘vetoed’ by a reigning sovereign for at least
a couple of centuries,--and the custom has naturally fallen into
desuetude,--but if it should be found at any time,--(I do not say it
_has_ been found) that Ministers are engaged in a seriously mistaken
policy, and are being misled by the doubtful propositions of private
financial speculators, so much as to consider their own advantage more
important and valuable than the prosperity of a country or the good of
a people,--then a king who does _not_ veto the same is a worse criminal
than those he tacitly supports and encourages!”
Lutera turned a deadly white,--his eyes fell before the clear, straight
gaze of his Sovereign,--but he said not a word.
“A king’s ‘veto’ has before now brought about a king’s dethronement,”
went on the monarch; “Should it do so in my case, I shall not greatly
care,--but if things trend that way, I shall lay my thoughts openly
before the People for their judgment. They seldom or never hear the
Sovereign whom they pay to keep, speak to them on a matter gravely
affecting their national destinies,--but they shall hear _me_,--if
necessary!”
The Marquis moistened his dry lips, and essayed to pronounce a few
words.
“Your Majesty will run considerable risk----”
“Of being judged as something more than a mere dummy,” said the
King--“Or a fool set on a throne to be fooled! True! But the risk can
only involve life,--and life is immaterial when weighed in the balance
against Honour. By the way, Marquis, permit me to return to you this
valuable gem”;--Here drawing off the Premier’s sapphire signet, he
handed it to him--“Almost I envy it! It is a fine stone!--and worthy of
its high service!”
“Your Majesty has increased its value by wearing it,” said Lutera,
recovering a little of his strayed equanimity in his determination to
probe to the bottom of the mystery which perplexed his mind. “May I
ask----”
“Anything in reason, my dear Marquis,” returned the King lightly, and
smiling as he spoke. “A thousand questions if you like!”
“One will suffice,” answered the Premier. “I had an unpleasant dream
last night about this very ring----”
“Ah!” ejaculated the King; “Did you dream that I had dropped it in the
sea on my way to The Islands yesterday?”
He spoke jestingly, yet with a kindly air, and Lutera gained courage to
look boldly up and straight into his eyes.
“I did not dream that you had lost it, Sir,” he answered--“but that
it had been stolen from your hand, and used by a spy for unlawful
purposes!”
A strange expression crossed the King’s face,--a look of inward
illumination; he smiled, but there was a quiver of strong feeling under
the smile. Advancing a step, he laid his hand with a light, half-warning
pressure on the Premier’s shoulder.
“Dreams always go by contraries, Marquis!” he said;--“I assure you, on
my honour as a king and a gentleman, that from the moment you lent it
to me, till now,--when I return it to you,--_that ring has never left my
finger_!”