very alarming sight. Stimulated by terror, his
mind worked quickly.

"Look here," he said to the King, "I've got a suggestion to make. Get
Madame to sit down and keep quiet for a few minutes."

The King had an experience, gathered during six years of intimacy, of
Madame's ways. He knew what to do with her. He got another glass of
brandy and a box of cigarettes. He set them on a table beside a deep
armchair. Madame suffered herself to be led to the chair.

"Now, my friend Gorman," said the King, "if you have a key which will
open the dead lock, make it trot out."

"What Donovan wants," said Gorman, "is a kingdom for his daughter. Not
Megalia in particular, but some kind of right to wear a crown. Any
other kingdom would do as well."

"But there is no other," said the King. "In all the courts of Europe
there is no other king in such a damned hole as I am, no other king
who would sell even if he could."

"I don't know Megalia well," said Gorman, "but there must surely be
some outlying corner of that interesting country--an island, for
instance--which you could make over, sporting, mineral and _royal_
rights, to Donovan; just as England gave Heligoland to the Germans and
somebody or other, probably the Turks, gave Cyprus to the English. The
thing is constantly done."

"But the Emperor," said the King. "Again and always the Emperor. All
roads lead to Rome. All _Real Politik_ brings us in the end back to
the Emperor."

"My idea," said Gorman, "would be, to choose a small island, quite a
small one, so small that the Emperor wouldn't notice it was gone. As a
matter of fact I expect a small island would suit Donovan better than
the whole country. He has a weak heart and has come over to Europe for
rest and quiet. He won't want to be bothered with the politics and
revolutions and complications which will be sure to arise in a large
tract of land like Megalia."

"A revolution," said the King, "arises there regularly. A revolution
is biennial in Megalia."

"In a really small island," said Gorman, "that would not happen. A man
like Donovan would feed the inhabitants until they got too fat for
revolutions. Now the question is, do you own an island of that kind?"

"There is," said the King, "Salissa. There is certainly Salissa. My
predecessor on the throne, my cousin Otto, resided in Salissa
until----. He thought it a safe place to reside because it was
so far from the land. He even built a house there. It is, I am
told,