“Have you no ambition?”

“Yes, madame.  But there are several kinds of ambition, as there are several kinds of success.  You have to knock people down with each kind, if you want it acknowledged.  As I told you awhile ago, I am tenacious beyond belief, and shall succeed in what I undertake.”

“What are you undertaking?”

“I am not undertaking to mount a throne.”

“I cannot believe it!  Where is there a man who would turn from what is offered you?  Consider the life before you in this country.  Compare it with the life you are throwing away.”  She joined her hands.  “Sire, the men of my house who fought for the kings of yours, plead through me that you will take your inheritance.”

I kept my eyes on Abbe Edgeworth.  He considered the padlocked book as an object directly in his line of vision.  Its wooden covers and small metal padlock attracted the secondary attention we bestow on trifles when we are at great issues.

I answered her,

“The men of your house—­and the women of your house, madame—­cannot dictate what kings of my house should do in this day.”

“Well as you appear to know him, madame,” said Abbe Edgeworth, “and loyally as you urge him, your efforts are wasted.”

She next accused me—­

“You hesitate on account of the Indians!”

“If there were no Indians in America, I should do just as I am doing.”

“All men,” the abbe noted, “hold in contempt a man who will not grasp power when he can.”

“Why should I grasp power?  I have it in myself.  I am using it.”

“Using it to ruin yourself!” she cried.

“Monseigneur!” The abbe rose.  We stood eye to eye.  “I was at the side of the king your father upon the scaffold.  My hand held to his lips the crucifix of our Lord Jesus Christ.  In his death no word of bitterness escaped him.  True son of St. Louis, he supremely loved France.  Upon you he laid injunction to leave to God alone the punishment of regicides, and to devote your life to the welfare of all Frenchmen.  Monseigneur! are you deaf to this call of sacred duty?  The voice of your father from the scaffold, in this hour when the fortunes of your house are lowest, bids you take your rightful place and rid your people of the usurper who grinds France and Europe into the blood-stained earth!”

I wheeled and walked across the floor from Abbe Edgeworth, and turned again and faced him.

“Monsieur, you have put a dart through me.  If anything in the universe could move me from my position, what you have said would do it.  But my father’s blood cries through me to-day—­’Shall the son of Louis XVI be forced down the unwilling throats of his countrymen by foreign bayonets?—­Russians—­Germans—­English!—­Shall the dauphin of France be hoisted to place by the alien?’—­My father would forbid it! . . .  You appeal to my family love.  I bear about with me everywhere the pictured faces of my family.  The father whose