“I did not imagine it for an instant, but your assurance was necessary. With your permission I will give directions for the issue of a special Gazette, setting forth that the Premier has resigned office on account of failing health.”
“Resigned? Failing health? I dismissed him—and in your presence—because he had grossly insulted me. What can you mean?”
“My dear Ernestine, the man was obviously out of his mind. He must have the benefit of the fact, and so must we.”
“I don’t understand, but he is not to be allowed to escape punishment.”
“Quite so. His punishment will be the most severe you can inflict—dismissal. It will not make it the less bitter for him if we call it compulsory resignation, but it will smooth the way for us. If we do not stop his mouth, he will raise the country against us to-morrow.”
“But I don’t see how your special Gazette will stop his mouth.”
“There is something else to be done as well. If you will allow me, I will send Stefanovics to him at once, with a message which must be delivered either to him or to his nephew, and only to them. If he will resign office promptly and without any fuss, on the ground of his health, you will overlook his conduct of to-day in consideration of his past services to Thracia, and permit him to retain the honours which have been conferred upon him, although he must remain at a distance from the Court. Moreover, we will give him a suitable pension, and find some permanent post under Government for Vassili. If he refuses, he will lose everything, and we shall take legal proceedings against him, of course in camerâ, for insulting the Crown.”
“He will prefer to appeal to the people,” said Ernestine decisively.
“I think not. In the old days he would have done it like a shot, and most effectively—the patriot Minister cast off in his old age by the ungrateful family he had raised to power, stripped of his well-earned honours, and persecuted revengefully by those whose unprincipled conduct he had sought to restrain. But he is not what he was, and I believe his outburst just now showed that he knew the game was played out. He has lost his nerve, he is in bad odour with the Powers—and he is afraid of me, while it is obvious that you and he can never work together again.”
“But it is not fair! You wish to allow him to escape altogether.”