CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
MEYER AT WORK
Meyer had not disliked the battle quite so much as he had expected. Karl's winter palace, the Brunvarad,—where he had taken up his headquarters,—was sufficiently remote from the danger zone to allow his mind to work coolly and collectedly on his master's behalf. And on the whole he almost enjoyed it. Karl was with him, silent, almost sulky in the enforced inactivity Fate and his councillors assigned him. He would have been happier in the trenches handling a rifle, or sighting one of the big Creusot guns that barked defiance at his foes. But for the moment circumstances held him in the little room where Meyer,—with a big map spread before him, and a telephone receiver at his ear,—issued the brief messages or despatched the brief notes that meant so much to the issues of the day.
"War has been compared to the game of chess," remarked Meyer during a brief pause when the telephone bell was silent, and no aide-de-camp rushed in with his vital message from the front; "and if the simile is trite and commonplace, it is certainly especially applicable in this case. One sacrifices piece for piece, a pawn for a knight, a knight for a castle, and so forth, and he who ultimately has the best of the exchange has an easy victory at the finish. In our case we are sacrificing a castle—the Marienkastel—for a Queen. When the enemy's Queen is hors-de-combat they can make but a poor bid for victory."
"The simile will bear pressing even closer," said Karl surlily, "for by the rules of the game the king can only move one step in any direction." And with a wave of his hand the discontented monarch indicated the four walls which confined his activities.
"It is our duty to prevent you from being checkmated, sire," returned the Commander-in-Chief. "Personally, I hold fighting a coarse sport, and am well content to do the intellectual part at the end of the telephone."
The ringing of the instrument punctuated his remark with singular appropriateness.
"Well, who are you and what is it?" he demanded.
"I'm Saunders," returned a voice; "I'm in the abatis in the churchyard."
Meyer glanced round at the clock. It pointed to the hour of twelve.
"Then you're there half an hour too soon," he returned.