Quite unconsciously, he used the same words which he had used with Uncle Bond; but he used them now with a difference. With Uncle Bond the words had been a challenge. To Judith, he offered them as an apology. A shadow obscured the radiance of Judith's face; but her glance did not waver. It was as if she were meeting something for which she had long been prepared. "I have always known," she acknowledged. A constraint that had no parallel in his experience held the King silent for a long minute or two. At last he forced himself to speak. "I have been here--sometime," he began desperately. "I have been--upstairs with Uncle Bond. I have just had lunch with him in his room. Uncle Bond has explained--a good many things to me. I saw you come here from the window. I followed you at once. I had to follow you. I hardly know why. Was it because there are--things between us which only you can explain?" He broke off there abruptly. Judith knew nothing of all that had happened, of course. Until she knew--something of all that had happened--of what use was his talk? If only he could tell her--something of what had happened--she might be able to begin to understand the bewilderment, and turmoil, within his overwrought, fevered brain. That she should be able to understand, that she should be able to sympathize with him, had become, at the moment, his paramount need. "Things have happened," he resumed desperately. "Things have happened that you know nothing about, I think. Queer things are happening, over there, at this moment!" He half turned from her, as he spoke, and pointed across the sunlit landscape, at the distant, wooded horizon. "Martial Law has been proclaimed. The Labour people are making trouble. They have called a universal strike. A few of them want to get rid of me, and run up the Red Flag. They haven't a chance, of course. The Duke is there. I know that you know the Duke! He was ready for them. He will be glad, I think, that they have given him this chance to crush them. Uncle Bond had a message from the Duke, waiting for me, when I arrived, to say that everything was--'proceeding in accordance with plan.' His plan!