Page:Roy Norton--The unknown Mr Kent.djvu/278

 "God Save Karl the Great!" they corrected him.

"—has told you that you owe much of what has been to-day given you, to me. With all respect for His Majesty's word, I wish to tell you, flatly, that it is not so. I did nothing. You owe it all to him. All I did was to advise regarding the employment of your industries. I approve of his grant of self-government, for I am an American; but I am as surprised as were you that he gave so freely."

They interrupted him with cheers, while he stood watching them, and evidently waiting to add something more.

"You owe me nothing," he declared. "But to others you owe much. You owe Her Royal Highness, the Princess Eloise, for her advice" and again they interrupted him with cheers.

"You owe to a much misunderstood man, a nobleman, steadfast, loyal and true, a great payment for his unfaltering devotion to the king, to you and to his duty; and to his plain honesty you are indebted beyond all words. I speak of Baron Von Glutz!"

He did not look around in that mad interim when again they shouted; but had he done so would have seen that the baron was for once abashed to dumbness. All that he, plain, simple old man, had ever [274]