Count Piper kept his glance on the dark rug at his feet; he was tingling with thoughts of great issues and large events; it was the eve of big affairs for his prosperous and successful country which was menaced by many and powerful enemies eager to seize the chance to despoil a youthful King; Count Piper felt himself equal to dealing with these concerns—but he was only a councilor of state, and must wait the pleasure of that same youthful King who even now was keeping him waiting for his dinner.
A slight impatience with fate darkened his thin clever face; it seemed so cruel a blow for Sweden that the late King, stern, wise, just, should die in his prime leaving his heritage in the hands of a boy and an old woman.
The Queen suddenly broke the prolonged pause.
“I seldom or never hear the truth, of course,” she said abruptly. “But you, Count, must have means of knowing many things. Tell me,” and her tone betrayed an anxiety she would never have owned to, “what do the people say of Karl?”
Count Piper knew perfectly well what was the general opinion of the young King—that he was considered idle, haughty, obstinate, and autocratic—the public was not likely to take any other view of one wholly devoted to amusements, and who gave no sign of being of the breed of his heroic father and grandfather beyond the imperious pride with which, on several occasions, he had asserted his position.
But Count Piper attached little importance to this verdict of the world and did not choose to repeat it to the ears of the Queen Dowager.
“His Majesty,” he replied, “has already given tokens of a spirit such as the Swedes love, and they await his manhood with many hopes.”
“He has spirit enough for ordinary impudence,” remarked the old woman drily; she was thinking how, as a boy of fifteen, he had removed her from the regency and assumed the government himself, and how, at his coronation, he had snatched the crown from the archbishop’s hands and placed it on his brow himself. “Has he spirit enough to go to war, and wit enough to be successful if he does?”
The statesman looked grave.
“I count upon his ancestors,” he replied.