He had made a desperate
effort to tell it the moment he was liberated from the box, but he
had not yet mastered that particular language which characterized his
master's race.

"To begin with," said the diplomat, "what would your Majesty say if I
should ask permission to purchase the entire loan?"

CHAPTER II. THE COUP D'ETAT OF COUSIN JOSEF

The king, who had been leaning forward, fell back heavily in his seat,
his eyes full wide and his mouth agape. Then, to express his utter
bewilderment, he raised his hands above his head and limply dropped
them.

"Five millions of crowns?" he gasped.

"Yes; what would your Majesty say to such a proposition?" complacently.

"I should say," answered the king, with a nervous laugh, "that my friend
had lost his senses, completely and totally."

"The fact is," the Englishman declared, "they were never keener nor more
lucid than at this present moment."

"But five millions!"

"Five millions; a bagatelle," smiling.

"Certainly you can not be serious, and if you were, it is out of the
question. Death of my life! The kingdom would be at my ears. The people
would shout that I was selling out to the English, that I was putting
them into the mill to grind for English sacks."

"Your Majesty will recollect that the measure authorizing this loan
was rather a peculiar one. Five millions were to be borrowed
indiscriminately, of any man or body of men willing to advance the money
on the securities offered. First come, first served, was not written,
but it was implied. It was this which roused my curiosity, or cupidity,
if you will."

"I can not recollect that the bill was as you say," said the king,
frowning.

"I believe you. When the bill came to you, you were not expected to
recollect anything but the royal signature. Have you read half of what
you have signed and made law? No. I am serious. What is it to you or to
the people, who secures this public mortgage, so long as the money
is forthcoming? I desire to purchase at face value the twenty
certificates."

"As a representative of England?"

The diplomat smiled. The king's political ignorance was well known. "As
a representative of England, Sire, I could not purchase the stubs from
which these certificates are cut. And then, as I remarked, I am an
unfettered agent of self. The interest at two per cent. will be a
fine income on a lump of stagnant money. Even in my own country, where
millionaires are so numerous as to be t