'Not a sign?'
'Not a sign.'
'I'm coming down,' said the man overhead....
Section 7
The Slavic fox stood upon a metal balcony in his picturesque Art Nouveau
palace that gave upon the precipice that overhung his bright little
capital, and beside him stood Pestovitch, grizzled and cunning, and now
full of an ill-suppressed excitement. Behind them the window opened into
a large room, richly decorated in aluminium and crimson enamel, across
which the king, as he glanced ever and again over his shoulder with a
gesture of inquiry, could see through the two open doors of a little
azure walled antechamber the wireless operator in the turret working at
his incessant transcription. Two pompously uniformed messengers waited
listlessly in this apartment. The room was furnished with a stately
dignity, and had in the middle of it a big green baize-covered table
with the massive white metal inkpots and antiquated sandboxes natural to
a new but romantic monarchy. It was the king's council chamber and
about it now, in attitudes of suspended intrigue, stood the half-dozen
ministers who constituted his cabinet. They had been summoned for twelve
o'clock, but still at half-past twelve the king loitered in the balcony
and seemed to be waiting for some news that did not come.
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