ven--to be counted with,' corrected Selpdorf gently. 'The other, the
eighth----'

'Has the initial fault of nationality. However, he goes to Sagan.'

The mist cleared as the sun rose higher until, by noon, the sky was of
a pale radiant blue laced with a delicate broidery of white
wind-scattered clouds. Looking westward the dark river wound away to the
sea, ringed here and there by the highly decorated bridges of
light-toned granite peculiar to Maasau. Revonde, in the sunshine, shone
in the colours of a moss-grown stone, gray and green, the twin ridges on
which it stood fretted and embossed to their summits with the palaces
and pinnacles, the spires and towers, and gardens of the spreading city.
The Grand Duke, as they rounded the mounting road to the parade ground,
looked back upon Revonde with a lingering glance. Selpdorf who was
seated opposite to him, had been replying to his grumbling questions as
to the condition of the royal exchequer with a depressing account of the
hopelessness of the situation.

'Revonde is a jewel after all!' said the Duke suddenly; 'a jewel can
always be mortgaged, Selpdorf.'

Selpdorf admitted that this was true, and also hinted that the jewel had
been used in one way or another pretty freely to raise the revenues for
a good many years, without giving much in the way of a _quid pro quo_,
beyond the vague hopes and airy promises which pledged the Maasaun
government to little or nothing. But now, he explained, the Powers were
growing weary of so unprofitable a speculation, and were inclined to
expect some definite return for their assistance.

The Duke listened moodily, lying back on his cushions, a thin-legged,
paunchy figure, whose features had lost their shapely mould under the
touch of dissipation. The nose hung long and fleshy between the pouched
skin of his cheekbones, the eyes showed a tell-tale slackness in the
under eyelid, where it merged into the loose wrinkles below. The lower
part of the face was covered by a long but sparse moustache, through
which at times could be discerned that terrible protrusion of the upper
lip that seems the herald of senility. Yet Gustave, Grand Duke of
Maasau, was only that day celebrating the completion of his
fifty-seventh year.

Where the carriage attained the level of the plateau, the main road
curved away inland to the right, while upon the left hand, under the
wall of encircling brown cliffs, a small brigade of all arms was
assembled to do h