“And to think,” said Barney, “that yesterday this muss was the largest corn mill west of anywhere. I guess we can both take vacations now, Bert.”
“Who would have thought that a single bolt of lightning could have resulted in such havoc?” mused Victoria.
“Who would?” agreed Lieutenant Butzow, and then, with a sudden narrowing of his eyes and a quick glance at Barney, “if it WAS lightning.”
The American looked at the Luthanian. “You think—” he started.
“I don’t dare think,” replied Butzow, “because of the fear of what this may mean to you and Miss Victoria if it was not lightning that destroyed the mill. I shouldn’t have spoken of it but that it may urge you to greater caution, which I cannot but think is most necessary since the warning I received from Lutha.”
“Why should Leopold seek to harm me now?” asked Barney. “It has been almost two years since you and I placed him upon his throne, only to be rewarded with threats and hatred. In that time neither of us has returned to Lutha nor in any way conspired against the king. I cannot fathom his motives.”
“There is the Princess Emma von der Tann,” Butzow reminded him. “She still repulses him. He may think that, with you removed definitely and permanently, all will then be plain sailing for him in that direction. Evidently he does not know the princess.”
An hour later they were all bidding Butzow good-bye at the station. Victoria Custer was genuinely grieved to see him go, for she liked this soldierly young officer of the Royal Horse Guards immensely.
“You must come back to America soon,” she urged.
He looked down at her from the steps of the moving train. There was something in his expression that she had never seen there before.