CHAPTER XVI
t was a night of strange dreams with the King.
For endless ages, as it seemed to him, watched all the time by a thousand flushed, curious faces, by a thousand eyes, he fled, down interminable corridors, across dark and desolate waste places, pursued, now by the old Duke of Northborough, now by Uncle Bond, and now by Judith. His feet were of lead. Time and again, he stumbled, and all but fell. His breath came in panting gusts. He reeled. His brain was on fire. And yet the chase continued, across continents, through dark, dank caves, along a dreary coast line, on the edge of precipices, by the side of angry seas—
The horror of it all was heightened by his knowledge that he was being pursued in error. Some inexplicable, mysterious misunderstanding between him, and his pursuers, accounted for the chase. They were pursuing him, hunting him down, mistakenly, full of a desire to serve him, to save him. He could not, he dare not, stop to explain their error to them. To stop was death. And Judith was the most persistent, the most relentless of his pursuers—
At last the darkness, through which he fled, was pierced by a blinding light, which played full upon his face, dazzling his eyes. They had turned a searchlight upon him, to aid them in hunting him down. All the world would see his fall. He twisted, this way and that, to avoid the light. But his frenzied efforts were all in vain. The light turned with him always, shining full upon his face. Then he fell—
Bright morning sunshine was streaming in through the open windows of the writing room, full upon the King's face, as he awoke. As he turned his head to avoid its blinding glare, he saw Uncle Bond's writing table, bare and empty, save for the candlesticks, in which mere stumps of candles remained. Slowly he became conscious of his surroundings. First he recognized the writing table, than the bare walls, then the room. Then he realized that he was lying on the sofa, under the windows. The blankets which covered him puzzled him for awhile. The fact that he was fully dressed in evening clothes puzzled him still more. Then memory was achieved, and he knew—who he was, where he was. Throwing off the blankets he sprang up on to his feet, and stretched himself with a sudden access of immense relief.
It was good to awake from so terrifying a dream—
A burst of radiant, childish laughter, outside the room, down below in the garden, drew him to the windows.
Old Jevons, the gardener, was on the lawn, with Joshua, the equally elderly garden donkey, harnessed to the lawn mower. Bill was perched on Joshua's unwilling back. Button was pulling at Joshua's obstinate mouth. And Joshua would not move. Joshua was a capricious animal, with a temper of his own. To the laughing Imps, his recurring mutinies were a never failing joy.