The Dark Star

The girls, resting their elbows on the tables, framed their faces with

slim and dusky hands, and gazed at Sengoun out of humorous,

half-veiled eyes.

"What do you wish to know, Prince Erlik?" they asked mockingly.

"Well, for example, is my country really mobilising?"

"Since the twenty-fifth."

"Tiens! And old Papa Kaiser and the Clown Prince Footit--what do

they say to that?"

"It must be stopped."

"What! Sang dieu! We must stop mobilising against the Austrians?

But we are not going to stop, you know, while Francis Joseph continues

to pull faces at poor old Servian Peter!"

Neeland said: "The evening paper has it that Austria is more reasonable and that the

Servian affair can be arranged. There will be no war," he added

confidently.

"There will be war," remarked Nini with a shrug of her bare, brown

shoulders over which her hair and her gilded sequins fell in a bright

mass.

"Why?" asked Neeland, smiling.

"Why? Because, for one thing, you have brought war into Europe!"

"Come, now! No mystery!" said Sengoun gaily. "Explain how my comrade

has brought war into Europe, you little fraud!"

Nini looked at Neeland: "What else except papers was in the box you lost?" she asked coolly.

Neeland, very red and uncomfortable, gazed back at the girl without

replying; and she laughed at him, showing her white teeth.

"You brought the Yellow Devil into Europe, M'sieu Nilan! Erlik, the

Yellow Demon. When he travels there is unrest. Where he rests there is

war!"

"You're very clever," retorted Neeland, quite out of countenance.

"Yes, we are," said Fifi, with her quick smile. "And who but M'sieu

Nilan should admit it?"

"Very clever," repeated Neeland, still amazed and profoundly uneasy.

"But this Yellow Devil you say I brought into Europe must have been

resting in America, then. And, if so, why is there no war there?"

"There would have been--with Mexico. You brought the Yellow Demon

here, but just in time!"

"All right. Grant that, then. But--perhaps he was a long time resting

in America. What about that, pretty gipsy?"

The girl shrugged again: "Is your memory so poor, M'sieu Nilan? What has your country done but

fight since Erlik rested among your people? You fought in Samoa; in

Hawaii; your warships went to Chile, to Brazil, to San Domingo; the

blood of your soldiers and sailors was shed in Hayti, in Cuba, in the

Philippines, in China----"