"In the jus ligatum."
Apafi, despite his semi-besotted state, instinctively shrunk back from such an expedient, and throwing himself into his arm-chair, looked blankly at Teleki.
"Are you not ashamed of yourself," he murmured in broken sentences, as tipsy people usually do, "to propose a secret conspiracy against a free nobleman? To privily conspire against him is contrary to the law of the land."
"It is not my fault if the expedient is shameful," returned Teleki calmly and steadfastly; "but it is shameful that the law should not possess sufficient power to bring a rebel to book, and that one of our own subjects should be able to openly defy justice and laugh at the decrees of the Prince. If in such a state of things the jus ligatum is our only means of defence, the shame falls not upon me but upon the Prince."
Apafi rose angrily from his seat and paced to and fro. The lords remained perfectly silent.
At last the Prince stopped short in front of Teleki, and, leaning on the back of his arm-chair, asked him—
"And how then do you propose to bring about this league?"
Nalaczi and Szekely exchanged a smile. It was plain that the idea had caught the Prince's fancy. Teleki beckoned to Szekely to fetch him writing materials and a strip of parchment.
"We will quickly draw up the necessary articles of impeachment; your Highness will subscribe them, and we'll secretly persuade the great men of the land to consent to Banfi's arrest and join the league before any legal steps have been taken."
At these words many of the gentlemen present began to bite their moustaches and move uneasily in their chairs.