"Leopold has defeated the Austrians," announced the former. "Until you returned to Lutha he considered the Aus-trians his best friends. I do not know how you could have reached or influenced him. It is to learn how you accom-plished it that I am here. The fact that he signed your pardon indicates that his attitude toward you changed sud-denly--almost within an hour. There is something at the bottom of it all, and that something I must know.""I am Leopold!" cried the king. "Don't you recognize me, Prince Peter? Look at me! Maenck must know me. It was Iwho wrote and signed the American's pardon--at the point of the American's revolver. He forced me to exchange cloth-ing with him, and then he brought me here to this room and left me."The two men looked at the speaker and smiled.
"You bank too strongly, my friend," said Peter of Blentz, "upon your resemblance to the king of Lutha. I will admit that it is strong, but not so strong as to convince me of the truth of so improbable a story. How in the world could the American have brought you through the castle, from one end to the other, unseen? There was a guard before the king's door and another before this. No, Herr Custer, you will have to concoct a more plausible tale.
"No," and Peter of Blentz scowled savagely, as though to impress upon his listener the importance of his next utterance, "there were more than you and the king involved in his sudden departure from Blentz and in his hasty change of policy toward Austria. To be quite candid, it seems to me that it may be necessary to my future welfare--vitally neces-sary, I may say--to know precisely how all this occurred, and just what influence you have over Leopold of Lutha.
Who was it that acted as the go-between in the king's nego-tiations with you, or rather, yours with the king? And what argument did you bring to bear to force Leopold to the action he took?""I have told you all that I know about the matter,"whined the king. "The American appeared suddenly in my apartment. When he brought me here he first blindfolded me. I have no idea by what route we traveled through the castle, and unless your guards outside this door were bribed they can tell you more about how we got in here than Ican--provided we entered through that doorway," and the king pointed to the door which had just opened to admit his two visitors.
"Oh, pshaw!" exclaimed Maenck. "There is but one door to this room--if the king came in here at all, he came through that door.""Enough!" cried Peter of Blentz. "I shall not be trifled with longer. I shall give you until tomorrow morning to make a full explanation of the truth and to form some plan whereby you may utilize once more whatever influence you had over Leopold to the end that he grant to myself and my associates his royal assurance that our lives and property will be safe in Lutha.""But I tell you it is impossible," wailed the king.
"I think not," sneered Prince Peter, "especially when I tell you that if you do not accede to my wishes the order of the Austrian military court that sentenced you to death at Bur-gova will be carried out in the morning."
With his final words the two men turned and left the room. Behind them, upon the floor, inarticulate with terror, knelt Leopold of Lutha, his hands outstretched in supplica-tion.