clung to the hope that he might have
been, deposited a letter, and gone again, possibly in the night. In
every visit, though, he was disappointed, but contented himself by
thinking that his father had acted wisely, and felt that it was not safe
to come for fear that he might be watched.

It was nearly a week since he had been to the house, and he was longing
for an opportunity to go again, but opportunity had not served, and he
came to the conclusion that he would slip off that very afternoon, after
exacting a promise from Andrew Forbes that he would keep in the anteroom
ready to attend to any little duty which might require the presence of
one of the pages.

To his surprise, though, Andrew was nowhere to be seen. To have
inquired after him would only have served to draw attention to his
absence, so he contented himself with waiting patiently, but minute by
minute he grew more anxious, feeling convinced that something must have
occurred.

"Whatever has happened?" he said to himself at last, as he saw officers
begin to arrive and be ushered into the Prince's room; but why, there
was no chance for him to know, as there was no one to whom he could
apply for information, and at last he sat alone in the great blank
saloon, fidgeting as if he were upon thorns, and inventing all manner of
absurd reasons to account for his companion's absence.

"I know," he said to himself at last; "he has noticed that there is
something on the way, and gone out to try and pick up news. He'll be
here directly."

But he was wrong. Andrew did not come, and several little things
occurred to show him that there was undue excitement about the place.

At last his suspense came to an end, as he sat alone, for Andrew
appeared looking flushed and excited, glanced sharply round as soon as
he was inside the door, caught sight of his friend, and half ran to join
him.

"Oh, here you are, then, at last!" cried Frank.

"At last," said the lad.

"Yes; where have you been--news-hunting?"

"Yes," he whispered excitedly; "news-hunting, and I ran it down."

"What is it? There are three officers with the Prince, and I heard some
one say that a messenger was to be despatched to bring the King back to
town."

"Did you hear that?" cried Andrew excitedly.

"Yes."

"Ah!" ejaculated Andrew.

"What is it? A riot?"

"Yes, a very big riot, lad; a very, very big one. Now we shall see."

"It doesn't seem likely for it to be _we_," said Frank sar