All Lustadt was in an uproar. The mad king had escaped. Little knots of excitedmen stood upon the street corners listening to each latest rumor concerningthis most absorbing occurrence. Before the palace a great crowd surged to andfro, awaiting they knew not what.
For ten years no man of them had set eyes upon the face of the boy-king who hadbeen hastened to the grim castle of Blentz upon the death of the old king, hisfather.
There had been murmurings then when the lad’s uncle, Peter of Blentz, hadannounced to the people of Lutha the sudden mental affliction which had fallenupon his nephew, and more murmurings for a time after the announcement thatPeter of Blentz had been appointed Regent during the lifetime of the young KingLeopold, “or until God, in His infinite mercy, shall see fit to restoreto us in full mental vigor our beloved monarch.”
But ten years is a long time. The boy-king had become but a vague memory to thesubjects who could recall him at all.