“Yes! I should have explained. Money is of no consequence at all. I had thought of a team of horses and a coach.”
He was suddenly serious. He eyed the girl with a new curiosity. She then was one of the daughters of this new world before whose golden key every Court in Europe had yielded. She was of striking appearance, perhaps beautiful, instinctively well bred. She might be destined to play a part in the affairs of Theos.
“‘Money is of no consequence at all,’” he repeated, thoughtfully. “We are poor folk in Theos, Miss Van Decht, and we do not often hear such words.”
“Sometimes I think,” she said, “that our wealth is our misfortune. Now you understand, don’t you? Prince Ughtred was very kind to us at Cairo and on the voyage back, and we have seen quite a little of him in London. I should like to give him something really useful. Please suggest something.”
“I will take you at your word then, Miss Van Decht,” he answered. “Send him a Maxim-Nordenfeld gun. If you want to be magnificent, send him a battery.”
She looked at him in amazement.
“Do you mean it?” she exclaimed.
“I do,” he answered. “Prince Ughtred is a very keen soldier, and he is never tired of praising these guns. For the first year or two at the least we shall have troublous times, and a battery of maxims might save all our lives and the throne. Theos has, alas, no money to spend in artillery, though her soldiers are as brave as any in the world.”
“Father and I will see about it to-morrow,” she declared. “Hush! here they come.”
Ughtred was approaching with her father, and watching him it occurred to her for the first time how well his new part in life would become him. He was tall and broad, and he moved with the free, easy dignity of a soldier accustomed to command.