The Weight of the Crown

by Fred M. White

"I followed you," the man addressed as Igon said. "What am I looking so annoyed about? Well, you will look quite as much annoyed, my friend, when you hear the news. We've lost the king."

Something like an oath rose to Mazaroff's lips. He glanced angrily at his companion.

"The thing is impossible," he said. "Why, I saw the king myself at four o'clock this afternoon in a state of hopeless intoxication. It was I who lured him from his hotel with the story of some wonderful dancing he was going to see, with a prospect of some gambling to follow. I spoke in glowing terms of the marvellous excellency of the champagne. I said he would have to be careful, as the police have their eyes on the place. Disguised as a waiter the king left his hotel and joined me. I saw him helplessly drunk, and I came away with instructions that the king was to be carefully watched, and that he was not to be allowed to leave. Don't stand there and tell me that my carefully planned coup of so many weeks has failed."

"I do tell you that, and the sooner you realize it the better," the other man said. "We put the king to bed and locked the door on the outside. Just before dusk the police raided the place——"

"By what right? It is a private house. Nothing has ever taken place there that the police object to. Of course, it was quite a fairy tale that I pitched to the King of Asturia."

"Well, there it is!" the other said gloomily. "The police raided the place. Possibly somebody put them up to it. That Maxgregor is a devil of a fellow who finds out everything. They found nothing, and went off professing to be satisfied. And when I unlocked the door to see that we hadn't gone too far with the king, he had vanished. I only found them out a little time ago, and I came to you at once. Not being an invited guest, I did not run the risk of coming to the house, but I got over the garden wall from the stables beyond, and here I am. It's no use blaming me, Mazaroff; I could not have helped it—nobody could have helped it."

Mazaroff paced up and down the gravel walk anxiously. His gloomy brows were knitted into a frown. A little while later and his face cleared again.

"I begin to see my way," he said. "We have people here to deal with cleverer than I anticipated. There is no time to be lost, Igon. Come this way."

The two rascals disappeared, leaving Jessie more mystified than ever. Then she rose to her feet in her turn and made her way towards the house. At any rate, she had made a discovery worth knowing. It seemed to be her duty to tell the queen what she had discovered. But the queen seemed to have vanished, for Jessie could not find her in the grounds of the house. As she came out of the hall she saw Ronald Hope, who appeared to be looking for somebody.