King John of Jingalo Part 38

The royal coach had already borne its occupants along two miles of the route; and continued exercise was making them warm.

"Good Heavens!" exclaimed the King, "it's very stuffy in here; I feel as if I were in a furnace. Why did you ask to have the windows closed, my dear?"

"It makes one feel so much safer," said the Queen, keeping her stereotyped smile, and sweeping a bow as she spoke.

"Safer from what?" Here his Majesty responded to a fresh burst of cheers.

"Accidents," replied his consort; "one never knows."

"Gla.s.s, my dear, does not protect one from the accidents of Kings. Gla.s.s can't stop bullets, you know."

"I didn't mean that sort of accident; and I wish you wouldn't talk about them just now."

"You always take out an umbrella when you don't want it to rain; and if one talks about accidents then they don't happen. At least that has always been my experience. What sort of accident do you mean?"

"Dust, and microbes, and infection, and all that sort of thing. There must be a lot of it about in so large a crowd; I wonder how many people with measles."

"What an idea!" exclaimed the King: "people with measles don't come out to see shows."

"Oh, yes, they do,--nursemaids especially. They all catch it from each other in the public parks; at least so I've been told. And whenever I see a perambulator now, I think of it."

"There are no perambulators here to-day," said the King, "so you needn't think about measles. Smallpox if you like; though it strikes me that all I have yet seen are remarkably healthy specimens--considering how many of them there are." And he bowed to the healthy specimens as he spoke.

"Very enthusiastic," murmured the Queen appreciatively.

"Yes; I wonder if presently they will be as enthusiastic about Max."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, nothing. I was only thinking ahead, in quite a general sort of way.

We seem lately to have become quite popular."

"I think we have always been."

"Yes, you have, my dear; about myself I was not so sure. Well, it's very gratifying to come upon it just now."

His Majesty felt a little guilty, for he had not yet told the Queen of what lay ahead; it was so much better that she should not know beforehand what she would never be able to understand.

Then for a while they relapsed into silence, each attending to what Charlotte would have described as their "business"--a carefully regulated succession of bows accompanied by a smile which never quite left off.

Presently the King spoke again. "By the way, where has Charlotte gone to?"

"Well, I hardly know," said the Queen. "She wrote to me from her first address--that college place; but said she was going on elsewhere, and I thought you settled that we were to leave her alone."

"I think she ought to have waited till to-morrow. As Max is away, she at least should have been here."

"So I told her; but she said she had a very particular engagement which she must keep; and I could see that, relying upon your promise, she meant to have her own way, so I said nothing."

"I hope they are going to like each other," said the King, his thoughts carrying on to the meeting which was now near.

"She and the Prince? Oh, yes, I think there's no doubt about it.

Strange, wasn't it, that her running away actually pleased him?"

"I suppose it was so very unusual. We don't as a rule get people to run away from us. It's generally all the other way. Look at this crowd! I wonder how the police manage to keep them back."

Smiling and bowing, the Queen replied: "They are so well behaved; and see, how patient. Many, I daresay, have been here for hours. Doesn't that show loyalty?"

"It isn't all loyalty, my dear; they like the whole spectacle, the troops, the coach, the piebald ponies. Last night I went to look at them; four of them have been left out."

"What a strange thing to do."

"But some have to be."

"No; going to see them, I mean."

"Well, I don't know; they play a very important part in the proceedings, and in a way they are heroes, for wherever they go with us they share our danger. I heard quite a lot of interesting things about them."

At this moment they were approaching a part of the route which separated them for a while from the popular plaudits. In the forefront was a deep archway, and beyond it was a brief stretch of road shut in by h.o.a.rdings and dominated by high masts of scaffolding, behind which new Government buildings were in process of erection. Across each front to left and right a few strings of bunting fluttered to give festive relief; for here there were no stands filled with spectators, no pavements lined with shouting crowds; and behind the palisades work had been knocked off for the day. The cry of the populace lulled down to a mere murmur, and the trampling of the hoofs echoed strangely as they pa.s.sed under the vaulted arch and along the walled-in track with its huge baulks of timber on both sides supporting the growth of stone walls.

Ahead stood a wide gateway opening by a sharp turn into Regency Row, whose broad thoroughfare of cream-tinted facades, now bright with flags, formed an ideal rallying-ground for the sightseeing mult.i.tude.

"Now there," said the King, pointing ahead to a high triangular building facing the gates through which they were about to emerge, "there is the place that I always think a bomb might be thrown from with much certainty and effect, plump into the middle of us, just as we are turning the corner."

"I do wish you would leave off talking about such things," said the Queen reproachfully, "or wait till we are safe home again. How can I keep on smiling, if you go putting bombs into my head?"

"I was only saying, my dear----"

Suddenly, from behind, an amazing detonation seemed to strike at the smalls of their backs, throwing them half out of their seats. The gla.s.s slide upon the Queen's side of the coach ran down with a crash, and one of the large gilt baubles from its roof toppled and fell into the road.

At the same instant a great blast and swirl of smoke blew by, shutting for a moment the outer world from view. Then loud cries, hullabalooings, shoutings--a scramble and clatter of hoofs as though three or four horses had gone down and were up again--a capering flash of pink silk calves--as the six footmen exploded upon from the rear sought safety in front where the eight piebald ponies were all standing on end with men hanging on to their noses. And then further disorder of a less violent kind, runnings to and fro, and from the crowd waiting ahead a vast and tumultuous cry rather jovial in its sound.

The King had risen from his seat, and trying to look out and see what was going on behind had put his head through the gla.s.s, his crown acting as a safe and effective battering ram.

"I do believe there has been an attempt," he said, drawing his head in again. "That certainly sounded like a bomb; not that I have had much experience of such things."

Then he did what he should have done at first, and let down the gla.s.s.

"I am going to faint," sighed the Queen, sinking back in her seat.

"Nonsense!" said the King sharply. "Pull yourself together, Alicia! You are not hurt."

"I think I am," she said. But the sharp tone acted as a tonic, and she settled herself comfortably in her corner and began quietly to cry.

There was still plenty of confusion going on. The piebald ponies had been brought to a standstill, and some of them were now showing temper.

A voluble and excited crowd was trying to break through the police lines and grasp the whole situation at a run. Troops were coming to the rescue; hors.e.m.e.n from the rear dashed by. Then a staff officer galloped up to the coach window, and reining a jiggetty steed saluted with agitated air and a rather white face.

"The danger is over, your Majesty," he gasped, a little out of breath, "only a few horses are down; no one is killed."

The King nodded acceptance of the news; and as he did so noticed a tiny fleck of blood upon the officer's cheek--no more than if he had cut himself in shaving. It seemed to give the correct measure of the catastrophe, and to a.s.sure him more than words could have done that the damage was really small.