The George Barr McCutcheon MEGAPACK ®. George Barr McCutcheon

and smiled ironically. The friendly girl left them at the door and they passed out of the castle.

      “I shall leave Edelweiss tomorrow,” said one, more to himself than to his companion, as they crossed the parade. The other gave a start and did not look pleased. Then he instinctively glanced toward the castle.

      “The Princess is at her window,” he cried, clutching Lorry’s arm and pointing back. But the other refused to turn, walking on blindly. “You ought not to have acted like that, Gren,” said Anguish, a few moments later. “She saw me call your attention to her, and she saw you refuse to look back. I don’t think that you should have hurt her.” Lorry did not respond, and there was no word between them until they were outside the castle gates.

      “You may leave tomorrow, Lorry, if you like, but I’m going to stay a while,” said Harry, a trifle confusedly.

      “Haven’t you had enough of the place?”

      “I don’t care a whoop for the place. You see, it’s this way: I’m just as hard hit as you, and it is not a Princess that I have to contend with.”

      “You mean that you are in love with the Countess?”

      “Emphatically.”

      “I’m sorry for you.”

      “Think she’ll turn me down?”

      “Unless you buy a title of one of these miserable counts or dukes.”

      “Oh, I’m not so sure about that. These counts and dukes come over and marry our American girls. I don’t see why I can’t step in and pick out a nice little Countess if I want to.”

      “She is not as avaricious as the counts and dukes, I’ll wager. She cares nothing fer your money.”

      “Well, she’s as poor as a church mouse,” said the other, doggedly.

      “The Countess poor? How do you know?’

      “I asked her one day and she told me all about it,” said Anguish.

      CHAPTER VI

      A CLASH AND IT’S RESULT

      “I feel like spending the rest of my days in that monastery up there,” said Lorry, after dinner that evening. They were strolling about the town. One was determined to leave the city, the other firm in his resolve to stay. The latter won the day when he shrewdly, if explosively, reminded the former that it was their duty as men to stay and protect the Princess from the machinations of Gabriel, that knave of purgatory. Lorry, at last recognizing the hopelessness of his suit, was ready to throw down his arms and abandon the field to superior odds. His presumption in aspiring for the hand of a Princess began to touch his sense of humor, and he laughed, not very merrily, it is true, but long and loudly, at his folly. At first he cursed the world and every one in it, giving up in despair, but later he cursed only himself. Yet, as he despaired and scoffed, he felt within himself an ever-present hope that luck might turn the tide of battle.

      This puny ray grew perceptibly when Anguish brought him to feel that she needed his protection from the man who had once sought to despoil and who might reasonably be expected to persevere. He agreed to linger in Edelweiss, knowing that each day would add pain to the torture he was already suffering, his sole object being, he convinced himself, to frustrate Gabriel’s evil plans.

      Returning late in the evening from their stroll, they entered a cafe celebrated in Edelweiss. In all his life Lorry had never known the loneliness that makes death welcome. Tonight he felt that he could not live, so maddening was the certainty that he could never regain joy. His heart bled with the longing to be near her who dwelt inside those castle walls. He scoffed and grieved, but grieved the more.

      The cafe was crowded with men and women. In a far corner sat a party of Axphain nobles, their Prince, a most democratic fellow, at the head of a long table. There were songs, jests and boisterous laughter. The celebration grew wilder, and Lorry and Anguish crossed the room, and, taking seats at a table, ordered wine and cigars, both eager for a closer view of the Prince. How Lorry loathed him!

      Lorenz was a good-looking young fellow, little more than a boy. His smooth face was flushed, and there was about him an air of dissipation that suggested depravity in its advanced stage. The face that might have been handsome was the reflection of a roue, dashing, devilish. He was fair-haired and tall, taller than his companions by half a head. With reckless abandon he drank and sang and jested, arrogant in his flighty merriment. His cohorts were not far behind him in riotous wit.

      At length one of the revelers, speaking in German, called on Lorenz for a toast to the Princess Yetive, his promised bride. Without a moment’s hesitation the Prince sprang to his feet, held his glass aloft, and cried:

      “Here’s to the fairest of the fair, sweet Yetive, so hard to win, too good to lose. She loves me, God bless her heart! And I love her, God bless my heart, too! For each kiss from her wondrous lips I shall credit myself with one thousand gavvos. That is the price of a kiss.”

      “I’ll give two thousand!” roared one of the nobles, and there was a laugh in which the Prince joined.

      “Nay! I’ll not sell them now. In after years, when she has grown old and her lips are parched and dry from the sippings I have had, I’ll sell them all at a bargain. Alas, she has not yet kissed me!”

      Lorry’s heart bounded with joy, though his hands were clenched in rage.

      “She will kiss me tomorrow. Tomorrow I shall taste what no other man has touched, what all men have coveted. And I’ll be generous, gentlemen. She is so fair that your foul mouths would blight with but one caress upon her tender lips, and yet you shall not, be deprived of bliss. I shall kiss her thrice for each of you. Let me count: thrice eleven is thirty-three. Aye, thirty-three of my kisses shall be wasted for the sake of my friends, lucky dogs! Drink to my Princess!”

      “Bravo!” cried the others, and the glasses were raised to lip.

      A chair was overturned. The form of a man landed suddenly at the side of the Prince and a rough hand dashed the glass from his fingers, the contents flying over his immaculate English evening dress.

      “Don’t you dare to drink that toast!” cried a voice in his astonished ear, a voice speaking in excited German. He whirled and saw a scowling face beside his own, a pair of gray eyes that flashed fire.

      “What do you mean?” he demanded, anger replacing amazement. The other members of his party stood as if spell-bound.

      “I mean that you speak of the Princess of Graustark. Do you understand that, you miserable cur?”

      “Oh!” screamed, the Prince, convulsed with rage, starting back and instinctively reaching for the sword he did not carry. “You shall pay for this! I will teach you to interfere—”

      “I’ll insult you more decidedly just to avoid misapprehension,” snarled Lorry, swinging his big fist squarely upon the mouth of the Prince. His Royal Highness landed under a table ten feet away.

      Instantly the cafe was in an uproar. The stupefied Axphainians regained their senses and a general assault was made upon the hotheaded American. He knocked another down, Harry Anguish coming to his assistance with several savage blows, after which the Graustark spectators and the waiters interfered. It was all over in an instant, yet a sensation that would live in the gossip of generations had been created. A Prince of the realm had been brutally assaulted! Holding his jaw, Lorenz picked himself from the floor, several of his friends running to his aid. There was blood on his lips and chin; it trickled to his shirt front. For some moments he stood panting, glaring at Lorry’s mocking face.

      “I am Lorenz of Axphain, sir,” he said at last, his voice quivering with suppressed anger.

      “It shall be a pleasure to kill you, Lorenz,” observed his adversary, displaying his ignorance of lese-majeste.

      Anguish, pale and very much concerned, dragged him away, the Prince leaving the cafe ahead of them, followed by his chattering, cursing companions. Prince Gabriel was standing near