Page:Hope--Sophy of Kravonia.djvu/116

SOPHY OF KRAVONIA "Long live Mistitch! Down with tyrants! Long live Captain Hercules!"

It was fuel to the flames. Mistitch drained his glass and hurled it on the floor.

"Well, who follows me?" he cried.

Half the men started to their feet; the other half pulled them down. Contending currents of feeling ran through the crowd; a man was reckless this moment, timid the next; to one his neighbor gave warning, to another instigation. They seemed poised on the point of a great decision. Yet what was it they were deciding? They could not tell.

Markart suddenly forgot his caution. He rushed to Mistitch, with his hands out and "For God's sake!" loud on his lips.

"You!" cried Mistitch. "By Heaven! what else does your General want? What else does Matthias Stenovics want? Tell me that!"

A silence followed—of dread suspense. Men looked at one another in fear and doubt. Was that true which Mistitch said? They felt as ordinary men feel when the edge of the curtain is lifted from before high schemes or on intrigues of the great.

"If I should meet the Prince to-night, wouldn't there be news for Stenovics?" cried Mistitch, with a roar of laughter.

If he should meet the Prince! The men at the tables could not make up their minds to that. Mistitch they admired and feared, but they feared the proud Prince, too; they had many of them felt the weight of his anger. Those who had stood up sank back in their places. One pot-bellied fellow raised a shout of hysterical laughter round him by rubbing his fat face with a napkin and calling out: "I should 98