h a billion milrays to look upon a live person again!"

He knew me as easily as if I hadn't been disguised at all. Which
frightened me; one may easily believe that.

"Quick, now, tell me the meaning of this fearful disaster," I said.
"How did it come about?"

"Well, if there hadn't been any Queen Guenever, it wouldn't have
come so early; but it would have come, anyway. It would have
come on your own account by and by; by luck, it happened to come
on the queen's."

"_And_ Sir Launcelot's?"

"Just so."

"Give me the details."

"I reckon you will grant that during some years there has been
only one pair of eyes in these kingdoms that has not been looking
steadily askance at the queen and Sir Launcelot--"

"Yes, King Arthur's."

"--and only one heart that was without suspicion--"

"Yes--the king's; a heart that isn't capable of thinking evil
of a friend."

"Well, the king might have gone on, still happy and unsuspecting,
to the end of his days, but for one of your modern improvements
--the stock-board. When you left, three miles of the London,
Canterbury and Dover were ready for the rails, and also ready and
ripe for manipulation in the stock-market. It was wildcat, and
everybody knew it. The stock was for sale at a give-away. What
does Sir Launcelot do, but--"

"Yes, I know; he quietly picked up nearly all of it for a song;
then he bought about twice as much more, deliverable upon call;
and he was about to call when I left."

"Very well, he did call. The boys couldn't deliver. Oh, he had
them--and he just settled his grip and squeezed them. They were
laughing in their sleeves over their smartness in selling stock
to him at 15 and 16 and along there that wasn't worth 10. Well,
when they had laughed long enough on that side of their mouths,
they rested-up that side by shifting the laugh to the other side.
That was when they compromised with the Invincible at 283!"

"Good land!"

"He skinned them alive, and they deserved it--anyway, the whole
kingdom rejoiced. Well, among the flayed were Sir Agravaine and
Sir Mordred, nephews to the king. End of the first act. Act
second, scene first, an apartment in Carlisle castle, where the
court had gone for a few days' hunting. Persons present, the
whole tribe of the king's nephews. Mordred and Agravaine propose
to call the guileless Arthur's attention to Guenever and Sir
Launcelot. Sir Gawaine, Sir Gareth, and Sir Gaheris will have
nothing to do wi