hroat, and let his head fall back on the pillow again. Tenderly
wiping his beard, and bidding the princess good night in paternal
tones, he then took his leave. Curdie would gladly have driven his
pick into his head, but that was not in his commission, and he let him
go. The little round man looked very carefully to his feet as he
crossed the threshold.

'That attentive fellow of a page has removed the mat,' he said to
himself, as he walked along the corridor. 'I must remember him.'

CHAPTER 20

Counterplotting

Curdie was already sufficiently enlightened as to how things were
going, to see that he must have the princess of one mind with him, and
they must work together. It was clear that among those about the king
there was a plot against him: for one thing, they had agreed in a lie
concerning himself; and it was plain also that the doctor was working
out a design against the health and reason of His Majesty, rendering
the question of his life a matter of little moment. It was in itself
sufficient to justify the worst fears, that the people outside the
palace were ignorant of His Majesty's condition: he believed those
inside it also--the butler excepted--were ignorant of it as well.
Doubtless His Majesty's councillors desired to alienate the hearts of
his subjects from their sovereign. Curdie's idea was that they
intended to kill the king, marry the princess to one of themselves, and
found a new dynasty; but whatever their purpose, there was treason in
the palace of the worst sort: they were making and keeping the king
incapable, in order to effect that purpose. The first thing to be seen
to, therefore, was that His Majesty should neither eat morsel nor drink
drop of anything prepared for him in the palace. Could this have been
managed without the princess, Curdie would have preferred leaving her
in ignorance of the horrors from which he sought to deliver her. He
feared also the danger of her knowledge betraying itself to the evil
eyes about her; but it must be risked and she had always been a wise
child.

Another thing was clear to him--that with such traitors no terms of
honour were either binding or possible, and that, short of lying, he
might use any means to foil them. And he could not doubt that the old
princess had sent him expressly to frustrate their plans.

While he stood thinking thus with himself, the princess was earnestly
watching the king, with looks of childish love and womanly ten