They found him in the room he called his study. He looked up from his desk as they entered.
“Father,” Sara said, “the King wants us to leave to-morrow morning. In forty-eight hours he says the city may be in danger.”
Mr. Van Decht wheeled round in his recently imported American chair, and puffed vigorously at his cigar.
“I wasn’t reckoning upon leaving just yet,” he remarked, quietly. “Were you, Sara?”
“No!”
Ughtred looked from one to the other.
“I am afraid you don’t quite understand the situation, Mr. Van Decht. I do not think it probable of course, but it is possible that the city may be surrounded in less than a week.”
Mr. Van Decht nodded.
“I guess it isn’t quite so bad as that,” he answered. “In any case, I’d like you to understand this. We’ve had a pretty good time here, and we haven’t any idea of scuttling out just because things aren’t exactly booming. I’ve a tidy idea of engineering, and I think I can show you a wrinkle or two in trench-making. Then there’s another thing—you’ll allow a man’s a right to do what he pleases with his own money?”