"If it please you, sire," said the first page, sinking on one knee, "When His Excellency the Count arrived he invited us to get inside the sack, at the bottom of which he told us we should find sweetmeats. And we crawled in—and I don't remember any more till I fell out just now."
"Just count these boys, Baron, will you?" said the King. "The whole dozen correct? Good. And now, sir," he added, turning to the Count, "I should like to hear what you have got to say."
"Allow me, sire," interrupted Marshal Federhelm, as Count Ruprecht seemed content to smile blandly. "His Excellency no doubt intended to afford your Majesties a little harmless diversion."
"That was all," said the Count. "This is a magic sack which has the property of turning anything inside it into whatever its owner wishes. I thought it might amuse you."
"Liar!" struck in Clarence. "You wouldn't have said a word about it but for Ruby! You meant to take those pumpkins—I mean pages—away with you. You know you did! I don't know what the Guv'nor and Mater think of it—but I consider myself it was a confounded liberty!"
"Well, well," said the King, "it was a mistake no doubt. But there's been no harm done, so perhaps we'd better leave it at that—for the present, you know, for the present."
But the Court Chamberlain could not allow such an opportunity to escape him. "Forgive me, sire," he said eagerly, "but your Majesties are evidently unacquainted with his Excellency's family history. The motive for his indiscretion will perhaps be better understood when I mention that his parents' title was formerly Bubenfresser, and that they were executed by command of the late King as being notorious ogres."
"So that was his game, was it?" cried Clarence. "Bagged our pages, meaning to gobble 'em up when he got 'em home! Am I to have an Ogre for a brother-in-law?"
At this there was a general cry of horror.
"Marshal," said the King, "you must have known all about this—and you gave that fellow an excellent character!"