He had used him, and his great leading
newspaper for his own political and financial purposes. He had
entrusted him with State secrets, in order to speculate thereon in all
the money-markets of the world. He had induced him to approach the
Premier with crafty promises of support, and to inveigle him by
insidious degrees into the same dishonourable financial 'deal.' So that
if this one man,--this fat, unscrupulous turncoat of a Jew,--chose to
speak out, he, Carl Perousse, Secretary of State, would be the most
disgraced and ruined Minister that ever attempted to defraud a nation!
His brows grew moist with fever-heat, and his tongue parched, with the
dry thirst of fear, as the gravity of the situation was gradually borne
in upon him. He began to calculate contingencies and possibilities of
escape from the toils that seemed closing around him,--and much to his
irritation and embarrassment, he found that most of the ways leading
out of difficulty pointed first of all to,--the King.
The King! The very personage whom he had called a Dummy, only bound to
do as he was told! And now, if he could only persuade the King that
he,--the poor Secretary of State,--was a deeply-injured man, whose
life's effort had been solely directed towards 'the good of the
country,' yet who nevertheless was cruelly wronged and calumniated by
his enemies, all might yet be well.
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