The George Barr McCutcheon MEGAPACK ®. George Barr McCutcheon

what is the alternative in case the indemnity is not paid?” asked Lorry, breathlessly, for he saw something bright in the approaching calamity.

      “The cession of all that part of Graustark lying north of Edelweiss, including fourteen towns, all of our mines and our most productive farming and grazing lands. In that event Graustark will be no larger than one of the good-sized farms in your western country. There will be nothing left for Her Royal Highness to rule save a tract so small that the word principality will be a travesty and a jest. This city and twenty-five miles to the south, a strip about one hundred fifty miles long. Think of it! Twenty-five by one hundred fifty miles, and yet called a principality! Once the proudest and most prosperous state in the east, considering its size, reduced to that! Ach, gentlemen—gentlemen! I cannot think of it without tearing out a heart-string and suffering such pains as mortal man has never endured. I lived in Graustark’s days of wealth, power and supremacy; God has condemned me to live in the days of her dependency, weakness and poverty. Let us talk no more of this unpleasant subject.”

      His hearers pitied the frank, proud old man from the bottoms of their hearts. He had told them the story with the candor and simplicity of a child, admitting weakness and despondency. Still he sat erect and defiant, his face white and drawn, his figure suggesting the famous picture of the stag at bay.

      “Willingly, your excellency, since it is distasteful to you. I hope, however, you will permit me to ask how much you are short of the amount,” said Lorry, considerately yet curiously.

      “Our minister of finance, Gaspon, will be able to produce fifteen million gavvos at the stated time—far from enough. This amount has been sucked from the people from excessive levy, and has been hoarded for the dreaded day. Try as we would, it has been impossible to raise the full amount. The people have been bled and have responded nobly, sacrificing everything to meet the treaty terms honorably, but the strain has been too great. Our army has cost us large sums. We have strengthened our defenses, and could, should we go to war, defeat Axphain. But we have our treaty to honor; we could not take up arms to save ourselves from that honest bond. Our levies have barely brought the amount necessary to, maintain an army large enough to inspire respect among those who are ready to leap upon us the instant we show the least sign of distress. There are about us powers that have held aloof from war with us simply because we have awed them with our show of force. It has been our safeguard, and there is not a citizen of Graustark who objects to the manner in which state affairs are conducted. They know that our army is an economy at any price. Until last spring we were confident that we could raise the full amount due Axphain, but the people in the rural districts were unable to meet the levies on account of the panic that came at a most unfortunate time. That is why we were hurrying home from your country, Mr. Lorry. Gaspon had cabled the Princess that affairs were in a hopeless condition, begging her to come home and do what she could in a final appeal to the people, knowing the love they had for her. She came, and has seen these loyal subjects offer their lives for her and for Graustark, but utterly unable to give what they have not—money. She asked them if she should disband the army, and there was a negative wail from one end of the land to the other. Then the army agreed to serve on half pay until all was tided over. Public officers are giving their services free, and many of our wealthy people have advanced loans on bonds, worthless as they may seem, and still we have not the required amount.”

      “Cannot the loan be extended a few years?” asked Lorry, angry with the ruler in the north, taking the woes of Graustark as much to heart as if they were his own.

      “Not one day! Not in London, Paris, nor Berlin.”

      Lorry lay back and allowed Anguish to lead the conversation into other channels. The Count remained for half an hour, saying as he left that the Princess and his wife had expressed a desire to be remembered to their guests.

      “Her Royal Highness spent the evening with the ministers of finance and war, and her poor head, I doubt not, is racking from the effects of the consultation. These are weighty matters for a girl to have on her hands,” solemnly stated the Count, pausing for an instant at the door of the apartment.

      After he had closed it the Americans looked long and thoughtfully at each other, each feeling a respect for the grim old gentleman that they had never felt for man before.

      “So they are in a devil of a shape,” mused Anguish. “I tell you, Gren, I never knew anything that made me feel so badly as does the trouble that hangs over that girl and her people. A week ago I wouldn’t have cared a rap for Graustark, but tonight I feel like weeping for her.”

      “There seems to be no help for her, either,” said Lorry, reflectively.

      “Graustark, you mean?”

      “No—I mean yes, of course,—who else?” demanded the other, who certainly had not meant Graustark.

      “I believe, confound your selfish soul, you’d like to see the nation, the crown and everything else taken away from this helpless, harrassed child. Then you’d have a chance,” exclaimed Anguish, pacing the floor, half angrily, half encouragingly.

      “Don’t say that, Harry, don’t say that. Don’t accuse me of it, for I’ll confess I had in my heart that meanest of longings—the selfish, base, heartless hope that you have guessed. It hurts me to be accused of it though, so don’t do it again, old man. I’ll put away the miserable hope, if I can, and I’ll pray God that she may find a way out of the difficulty.”

      They went to sleep that night, Anguish at once, Lorry not for hours, harboring a determination to learn more about the condition of affairs touching the people of Graustark and the heart of their Princess.

      GRAUSTARK (Part 2)

      CHAPTER XIII

      UNDER MOON AND MONASTERY

      For two days Lorry lived through intermittent stages of delight and despondency. His recovery from the effects of the blow administered by Dannox was naturally rapid, his strong young constitution coming to the rescue bravely. He saw much of the Princess, more of the Countess Dagmar, and made the acquaintance of many lords and ladies for whom he cared but little except when they chose to talk of their girlish ruler. The atmosphere of the castle was laden with a depression that could not be overcome by an assimilated gaiety. There was the presence of a shadow that grew darker and nearer as the days went by, and there were anxious hearts under the brave, proud spirits of those who held the destiny of Graustark in their hands.

      The princess could not bide the trouble that had sprung up in her eyes. Her laugh, her gay conversation, her rare composure and gentle hauteur were powerless to drive away the haunted, worried gleam in those expressive eyes of blue. Lorry had it on his tongue’s end a dozen times during the next day or so after the count’s narrative to question her about the condition of affairs as they appeared to her. He wondered whether she, little more than a girl, could see and understand the enormity of the situation that confronted her and her people. A strange, tender fear prevented him from speaking to her of the thing which was oppressing her life. Not that he expected a rebuff from her, but that he could not endure the thought of hearing her brave, calm recital of the merciless story. He knew that she could narrate it all to him more plainly than had her uncle. Something told him that she was fully aware of the real and underlying conditions. He could see, in his imagination, the proud, resigned face and manner of this perplexed Princess, as she would have talked to him of her woes, and he could also picture the telltale eyes and the troubled expression that would not be disguised.

      The Countess Dagmar, when not monopolized by the very progressive, or aggressive Anguish, unfolded to Lorry certain pages in the personal history of the Princess, and he, of course, encouraged her confidential humor, although there was nothing encouraging in it for him.

      Down by the great fountain, while the soldiers were on parade, the fair but volatile Countess unfolded to Lorry a story that wrenched his heart so savagely that anger, resentment, helplessness and love oozed forth and enveloped him in a multitude of emotions that would not disperse. To have gone to the Princess and laid down his life to save her would have given him pleasure, but he had promised something to her that could not be forgotten in a day. In his swelling heart he prayed for the time to come when he