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 _Rat_cliffe. 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.