"I followed your Majesty's advice," said Meyer. "I was wrong. I should have followed Herr Saunders'. He advised, if I remember rightly, a battalion of Guards and a squadron of Dragoons." "Do you mean to say," demanded the King, with some warmth, "that four armed men were incapable of dealing with one priest?" "So it appears," returned Meyer calmly. "They say there was some sort of a rescue. That, of course, may be a lie to excuse their failure. Any way, one of them is suffering from a broken thigh, the result of a fall from a window. Another has a dislocated jaw. Two others,--who pursued our friend down the Sichelgasse--were foolish enough to follow him along the banks of the Niederkessel. Fortunately they could both swim." The King turned with a gesture of impatient weariness to Saunders. "What do you say?" he demanded. "Yes, what do you say?" said Meyer, putting up his eyeglass and fixing his glance on the Englishman. Saunders shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, I say, that there evidently must have been some sort of a rescue." "A most determined rescue," added Meyer. "A most determined and reckless rescue," affirmed Saunders, meeting Meyer's glance without flinching. "But your advice, Saunders," said the King. "I gave it you yesterday, sire. Act! Hitherto we have schemed. We have been patting the mad dog on the head, but as he still shows his teeth,--shoot him!" "Who is the 'him'?" demanded Meyer. "The sort of person who rescues rebels when they are being arrested?" "By mad dog," explained Saunders, "I meant the snarling, discontented, dangerous element in Weidenbruck. We have had plenty of clever schemes for pacification. What we want is a little stupid brutality." "Saunders is right," said the King. "In theory I am a Democrat, a Socialist, a believer in the divinity of the _vox populi_. In practice I am a believer in platoon firing and _lettres de cachet_. There are only two nations in Europe who are genuinely capable of self-government, and Grimland is not one of them. We have tried the velvet glove, and we must show that it contains a hand of steel, and not a palsied member." "So be it," said Meyer, with a slight inclination of his head. "We will give the policy of open repression a trial, a fair trial and a full trial, and may the God of Jews and Gentiles teach the loyalists to shoot straight." Saunders scanned Meyer's face critically. There was no colour in his sunken cheek, no fire in his heavy eye. The man had no stomach for fighting, and his complex nature abhorred straightforward measures. Yet he had proved himself a faithful servant before, and though life meant more to him than to most soldiers, he was not one to purchase personal safety by the betrayal of his sovereign. Again Herr Bomcke upraised his honeyed tones. "Captain von Hügelweiler," he announced. The Captain bowed, and then stood at the salute. "Good-morning, Captain," said his Majesty. "To what am I indebted for this honour?"