The kneeling figure sprang to his feet with a fierce stagger.
"Ludicrous!" he cried, with a fiery face.
"Oh, come, come," said the King, impatiently, "you needn't keep it up with me. The augurs must wink sometimes from sheer fatigue of the eyelids. Let us enjoy this for half an hour, not as actors, but as dramatic critics. Isn't it a joke?"
Adam Wayne looked down like a boy, and answered in a constrained voice—
"I do not understand your Majesty. I cannot believe that while I fight for your royal charter your Majesty deserts me for these dogs of the gold hunt."
"Oh, damn your—But what's this? What the devil's this?"
The King stared into the young Provost's face, and in the twilight of the room began to see that his face was quite white and his lip shaking.
"What in God's name is the matter?" cried Auberon, holding his wrist.
Wayne flung back his face, and the tears were shining on it.