"I cannot pay it," said Rudolf. "I would play you again, to double the debt or wipe it out, but I have nothing of value enough to stake."
The desire which had been nursed for long in the Count's heart now saw the moment of its possible realisation.
He leant over the table, and, smoothing his beard with his hand, said gently:
"The amount is no more than half the value of your Majesty's Castle and demesne of Zenda."
The King started and forced a laugh.
"Aye, Zenda spoils the prospect from Festenburg, does it?" said he. "But I will not risk Zenda. An Elphberg without Zenda would seem like a man robbed of his wife. We have had it since we have had anything or been anything. I should not seem King without it."
"As you will, sire. Then the debt stands?" He looked full and keenly into the King's eyes, asking without words, "How will you pay it?" and adding without words, "Paid it must be." And the King read the unspoken words in the eyes of Count Nikolas.
The King took up his glass, but finding it empty flung it angrily on the floor, where it shivered into fragments at Count Nikolas's feet; and he shifted in his chair and cursed softly under his breath. Nikolas sat with the dice-box in his hand and a smile on his lips; for he knew that the King could not pay, and therefore must play, and he was in the vein, and did not doubt of winning from the King Zenda and its demesne. Then he would be the greatest lord in the kingdom, and hold for his own a kingdom within the kingdom, and the two strongest places in all the land. And a greater prize might then dangle in reach of his grasp.
"The devil spurs and I gallop," said the King at last. And he took up the dice-box and rattled it.
"Fortune will smile on you this time, sire, and I shall not grieve at it," said Count Nikolas with a courteous smile.