A newsboy
ran in front of them displaying a poster with the intelligence "Essex
wickets fall rapidly"--a semblance of county cricket still survived under
the new order of things. Near the saluting base some thirty or forty
motorcars were drawn up in line, and Cicely and her companions exchanged
greetings with many of the occupants.

"A lovely day for the review, isn't it?" cried the Grafin von Tolb,
breaking off her conversation with Herr Rebinok, the little Pomeranian
banker, who was sitting by her side. "Why haven't you brought young Mr.
Meadowfield? Such a nice boy. I wanted him to come and sit in my
carriage and talk to me."

"He doesn't talk you know," said Cicely; "he's only brilliant to look
at."

"Well, I could have looked at him," said the Grafin.

"There'll be thousands of other boys to look at presently," said Cicely,
laughing at the old woman's frankness.

"Do you think there will be thousands?" asked the Grafin, with an anxious
lowering of the voice; "really, thousands? Hundreds, perhaps; there is
some uncertainty. Every one is not sanguine."

"Hundreds, anyway," said Cicely.

The Grafin turned to the little banker and spoke to him rapidly and
earnestly in German.

"It is most important that we should consolidate our position in this
country; we must coax the younger generation over by degrees, we must
disarm their hostility. We cannot afford to be always on the watch in
this quarter; it is a source of weakness, and we cannot afford to be
weak. This Slav upheaval in south-eastern Europe is becoming a serious
menace. Have you seen to-day's telegrams from Agram? They are bad
reading. There is no computing the extent of this movement."

"It is directed against us," said the banker.

"Agreed," said the Grafin; "it is in the nature of things that it must be
against us. Let us have no illusions. Within the next ten years, sooner
perhaps, we shall be faced with a crisis which will be only a beginning.
We shall need all our strength; that is why we cannot afford to be weak
over here. To-day is an important day; I confess I am anxious."

"Hark! The kettledrums!" exclaimed the commanding voice of Lady
Bailquist. "His Majesty is coming. Quick, bundle into the car."

The crowd behind the police-kept lines surged expectantly into closer
formation; spectators hurried up from side-walks and stood craning their
necks above the shoulders of earlier arrivals.

Through the archway at Hyde Par