Page:Hope--Sophy of Kravonia.djvu/113

AT THE GOLDEN LION "What the devil will come of this business?" thought Markart, as he followed them over the little bridge which spanned the canal, and thence to the door of the Golden Lion. Behind them still he passed the seats on the pavement and entered the great saloon. As Mistitch and his companions came in, three-fourths of the company sprang to their feet and returned the salute of the new-comers; so strongly military in composition was the company—officers on one side of a six-feet-high glass screen which cut the room in two, sergeants and their inferiors on the other. A moment's silence succeeded the salute. Then a young officer cried: "The King has interfered?" It did not occur to anybody that the Commandant might have changed his mind and reversed his decree; for good or evil, they knew him too well to think of that.

"The King interfered?" Mistitch echoed, in his sonorous, rolling, thick voice. "No; we've interfered ourselves, and walked out! Does any one object?"

He glared a challenge round. There were officers present of superior rank—they drank their beer or wine discreetly. The juniors broke into a ringing cheer; it was taken up and echoed back from behind the glass screen, to which a hundred faces were in an instant glued, over which, here and there, the head of some soldier more than common tall suddenly projected.

"A table here!" cried Mistitch. "And champagne! Quick! Sit down, my boys!"

A strange silence followed the impulsive cheers. Men were thinking. Cheers first, thoughts afterwards, was the order in Slavna as in many other cities. Now they recognized the nature of this 95