Into the palace, through the vast rotunda, past the throne, and into the very apartment of the king himself she led him hastily. A royal attendant met them and held up his hands warningly. “The king is asleep,” he said in an undertone.
“Wake him—wake him at once!” commanded the excited girl.
“I cannot, it would offend him,” was the reply.
She did not pause an instant, but darting past the man and running to the king's couch, she drew the curtain aside and touched the sleeper. He waked in anger, but her first word disarmed him.
“Alpha is in danger.”
“What!” he growled, half awake. “The sea is breaking through in the west, and running into the internal fires.”
“How do you know that?”
“A dense cloud is rising in the west, and:——”
“Impossible!” the word came from far down in his throat, and he was ghastly pale. He ran to the table and touched a button and, to the astonishment of Thorndyke, the walls on the western side of the room silently parted, showing a little balcony overlooking the street below. The king went hastily out and looked toward the west. The others followed him. The princess stifled a cry of alarm when she glanced at the sky.
Great black, rolling clouds were rapidly spreading along the horizon.