Mr. Inspector!" cried the King in surprise, recognizing the face.

"I beg your Majesty's pardon."

"Ah! You came to see that everything was safe? This time you were a
little too early. Still, as you are here, I should rather like to know
how far those keys do allow you to penetrate?"

"Everywhere, your Majesty."

"You mean, even to the private apartments?"

Apparently he did.

"Do you often have occasion to use them?"

"Not after to-night, your Majesty--never again."

"Oh, do not suppose that I am objecting, if it is really necessary."

"I give these keys up to-morrow, sir," said the man. "I ought to have
given them up to-day; but I wanted to see your Majesty."

The King drew himself up; this seemed an intrusion.

"You could have asked for an interview," he said.

"I could have asked to the day of my death, sir; you would never have
heard of it."

"You could have written."

"Does your Majesty think that all letters personally addressed are even
reported to your Majesty?"

"I suppose not all of them," said the King after considering the matter.

"Not one in a hundred, sir."

"Still, any that are important I hear of."

"Mine, sir, would not have been reckoned important," said the man
bitterly.

The King looked hard at him, not with any real suspicion, for his
straightforward bearing inspired liking as well as confidence. But here
was a man whose measure must be carefully taken, for he was certainly
doing a very extraordinary thing.

"And have you something really important to tell me?"

Their eyes met on a pause that spoke better than words.

"Yes," said the man. Quietly he shut the door.

"Won't you come nearer?" said the King, for the depth of a large chamber
divided them. But the disciplined figure kept its place. Slowly but
without hesitation he gave what he had to say.

"I am dismissed the force," he began; "but that's not important--at
least only to me--though I suppose that's partly why I'm here, for a man
must fight when his living is taken from him. I am dismissed because
your Majesty got out of the palace the other night without my hearing of
it."

The King breathed his astonishment, but said nothing.

"I admit I ought to have known, but the man we had on duty at that door
didn't know your Majesty--at least not so as to be sure. I asked him
yesterday who it was went out, and he said--well, sir, he thought it was
one of the palace stewards. They use that door a good deal at night,