“There is something I must tell you,” he said.

He had learned to relate incidents in few but clear words when he related them to his father.  It had been part of his training.  Loristan had said that he might sometime have a story to tell when he had but few moments to tell it in—­some story which meant life or death to some one.  He told this one quickly and well.  He made Loristan see the well-dressed man with the deliberate manner and the keen eyes, and he made him hear his voice when he said, “Tell your father that you are a very well-trained lad.”

“I am glad he said that.  He is a man who knows what training is,” said Loristan.  “He is a person who knows what all Europe is doing, and almost all that it will do.  He is an ambassador from a powerful and great country.  If he saw that you are a well-trained and fine lad, it might—­it might even be good for Samavia.”

“Would it matter that I was well-trained? Could it matter to Samavia?” Marco cried out.

Loristan paused for a moment—­watching him gravely—­looking him over—­his big, well-built boy’s frame, his shabby clothes, and his eagerly burning eyes.

He smiled one of his slow wonderful smiles.

“Yes.  It might even matter to Samavia!” he answered.

VI

THE DRILL AND THE SECRET PARTY

Loristan did not forbid Marco to pursue his acquaintance with The Rat and his followers.

“You will find out for yourself whether they are friends for you or not,” he said.  “You will know in a few days, and then you can make your own decision.  You have known lads in various countries, and you are a good judge of them, I think.  You will soon see whether they are going to be men or mere rabble.  The Rat now—­how does he strike you?”

And the handsome eyes held their keen look of questioning.

“He’d be a brave soldier if he could stand,” said Marco, thinking him over.  “But he might be cruel.”

“A lad who might make a brave soldier cannot be disdained, but a man who is cruel is a fool.  Tell him that from me,” Loristan answered.  “He wastes force—­his own and the force of the one he treats cruelly.  Only a fool wastes force.”

“May I speak of you sometimes?” asked Marco.

“Yes.  You will know how.  You will remember the things about which silence is the order.”

“I never forget them,” said Marco.  “I have been trying not to, for such a long time.”

“You have succeeded well, Comrade!” returned Loristan, from his writing-table, to which he had gone and where he was turning over papers.

A strong impulse overpowered the boy.  He marched over to the table and stood very straight, making his soldierly young salute, his whole body glowing.

“Father!” he said, “you don’t know how I love you!  I wish you were a general and I might die in battle for you.  When I look at you, I long and long to do something for you a boy could not do.  I would die of a thousand wounds rather than disobey you—­or Samavia!”