The George Barr McCutcheon MEGAPACK ®. George Barr McCutcheon

begged Bolaroz to continue to make the Court his home while in Graustark, and the old Prince responded with the declaration that he would remain long enough to sign and approve the new covenant, at least. Before stepping from the throne, Yetive called in low tones to Lorry, a pretty flush mantling her cheek:

      “Will you come to me in half an hour?”

      “For my reward?” he asked, eagerly.

      “Ach?” she cried, softly, reprovingly. Count Halfont’s face took on a troubled expression as he caught the swift communication in their eyes. After all, she was a Princess.

      She passed from the room beside Halfont, proud and happy in the victory over despair, glorying in the exposure of her heart to the world, her blood tingling and dancing with the joys of anticipation. Lorry and Anguish, the wonder and admiration of all, were given a short but convincing levee in the hallway. Lords and ladies praised and lauded them, overwhelming them with the homage that comes to the brave. But Gaspon uttered one wish that struck Lorry’s warm, leaping heart like a piece of ice.

      “Would to God that you were a Prince of the realm,” said the minister of finance, a look of regret and longing in his eyes. That wish of Gaspon’s sent Lorry away with the sharp steel of desolation, torturing intensely as it drove deeper and deeper the reawakened pangs of uncertainty. There still remained the fatal distance between him and the object of his heart’s desire.

      He accompanied Captain Quinnox to his quarters, where he made himself presentable before starting for the enchanted apartment in the far end of the castle. Eager, burning passion throbbed side by side with the cold pulsing of fear, a trembling race between two unconquerable emotions. Passion longed for the voice, the eyes, the caresses; fear cried aloud in every troubled throb: “You will see her and kiss her and then you will be banished.”

      The two emotions thus thrown together, clashing fiercely for supremacy, at last wove themselves into a single, solid, uncompromising whole. Out of the two grew an aggressive determination not to be thwarted. Love and fear combined to give him strength; from his eyes fled the hopeless look, from his brain the doubt, from his blood the chill.

      “Quinnox, give me your hand—don’t mind the blood! You have been my friend, and you have served her almost to the death. I injured and would have killed you in that cell, but it was not in anger. Will you be my friend in all that is to follow?”

      “She has said that she loves you,” said the captain, returning the hand clasp. “I am at your service as well as hers.”

      A few moments later Lorry was in her presence. What was said or done during the half hour that passed between his entrance and the moment that brought them side by side from the room need not be told. That the interview had had its serious side was plain. The troubled, anxious eyes of the girl and the rebellious, dogged air of the man told of a conflict now only in abeyance.

      “I will never give you up,” he said, as they came from the door. A wistful gleam flickered in her eyes, but she did not respond in words.

      Near the head of the stairway an animated group of persons lingered. Harry Anguish was in the center and the Countess Dagmar was directly in front of him, looking up with sparkling eyes and parted lips. The Count and Countess Halfont, Gaspon, the Baron Dangloss, the Duke of Mizrox, with other ladies and gentlemen, were being entertained by the gay-spirited stranger.

      “Here he comes,” cried the latter, as he caught sight of the approaching couple.

      “I am delighted to see you, Harry. You were the friend in need, old man,” said Lorry, wringing the other’s hand. Yetive gave him her hand, her blue eyes overflowing.

      “Mr. Anguish had just begun to tell us how he—how he—” began Dagmar, but paused helplessly, looking to him for relief.

      “Go ahead, Countess; it isn’t very elegant, but it’s the way I said it. How I ‘got next’ to Gabriel is what she wants to say. Perhaps your Highness would like to know all about the affair that ended so tragically. It’s very quickly told,” said Anguish.

      “I am deeply interested,” said the Princess, eagerly.

      “Well, in the first place, it was all a bluff,” said he, coolly.

      “A what!” demanded Dagmar.

      “Bluff,” responded Harry, briefly; “American patois, dear Countess.”

      “In what respect,” asked Lorry, beginning to understand.

      “In all respects. I didn’t have the slightest sign of proof against the festive Prince.”

      “And you—you did all that ‘on a bluff’?” gasped the other.

      “Do I understand you to say that you have no evidence against Gabriel?” asked Halfont, dumbfounded.

      “Not a particle.”

      “But you said his confederate had confessed,” protested Dangloss.

      “I didn’t know that he had a confederate, and I wasn’t sure that he was guilty of the crime,” boasted Anguish, complacently enjoying the stupefaction.

      “Then why did you say so?” demanded Dangloss, excited beyond measure.

      “Oh, I just guessed at it!”

      “God save us!” gasped Baron Dangloss, Chief of Police.

      “Guessed at it?” cried Mizrox.

      “That’s it. It was a bold stroke, but it won. Now, I’ll tell you this much. I was morally certain that Gabriel killed the Prince. There was no way on earth to prove it, however, and I’ll admit it was intuition or something of that sort which convinced me. He had tried to abduct the Princess, and he was madly jealous of Lorenz. Although he knew there was to be a duel, he was not certain that Lorenz would lose, so he adopted a clever plan to get rid of two rivals by killing one and casting suspicion on the other. These deductions I made soon after the murder, but, of course, could secure no proof. Early this morning, at the hotel, I made up my mind to denounce him suddenly if I had the chance, risking failure but hoping for such an exhibition as that which you saw. It was clear to me that he had an accomplice to stand guard while he did the stabbing, but I did not dream it was Berrowag. Lorry’s sensational appearance, when I believed him to be far away from here, disturbed me greatly but it made it all the more necessary that I should take the risk with Gabriel. As I watched him I became absolutely convinced of his guilt. The only way to accuse him was to do it boldly and thoroughly, so I rang in the accomplice and the witness features. You all know how the ‘bluff’ worked.”

      “And you had no more proof than this?” asked Dangloss, weakly.

      “That’s all,” laughed the delighted strategist.

      Dangloss stared at him for a moment, then threw up his hands and walked away, shaking his head, whether in stupefied admiration or utter disbelief, no one knew. The others covered Anguish with compliments, and he was more than ever the hero of the day. Such confidence paralyzed the people. The only one who was not overcome with astonishment was his countryman.

      “You did it well,” he said in an undertone to Anguish; “devilish well.”

      “You might at least say I did it to the queen’s taste,” growled Anguish, meaningly.

      “Well, then, you did,” laughed Lorry.

      CHAPTER XXVII

      ON THE BALCONY AGAIN

      Three persons in the royal castle of Graustark, worn by the dread and anxiety of weeks, fatigued by the sleepless nights just past, slumbered through the long afternoon with the motionless, deathlike sleep of the utterly fagged. Yetive, in her darkened bed chamber, dreamed, with smiling lips, of a tall soldier and a throne on which cobwebs multiplied. Grenfall Lorry saw in his dreams a slim soldier with troubled face and averted, timid eyes, standing guard over him with a brave, stiff back and chin painfully uplifted. Captain Quinnox dreamed not, for his mind was tranquil in the assurance that he had been forgiven