“You have never been in Europe, then, Miss Strong?”
Count Szalaki turned smilingly to his _vis-à-vis_ as they seated
themselves at the dining-table in a room that appeared luxurious even to
the eye of the guest. There was a peculiarity in his pronunciation that
defies reproduction in cold type. His voice was gentle and carefully
modulated, and the English language seemed to do homage to his rank, for
it fell from his lips in a musical softness that was extremely pleasing
to the ear.
Kate Strong was fascinated, against her will, by the dark gray eyes of
the picturesque youth at her side. His black hair curled romantically
about a high, white brow, and his mouth, symmetrically curved, indicated
an imaginative and generous temperament. His white, even teeth added
vastly to the brilliancy of his smile. There was a touch of embarrassment
in his manner, now and then, that seemed to exact sympathy from his
entertainers.
“Not since I was quite young,” answered Kate, with the air of one who has
reached extreme old age.
“My sister,” remarked Ned Strong, as the butler removed his
soup-plate—“my sister, Count Szalaki, is a tremendous democrat, you know.
She won’t go to Europe, I fear, until every country over there has
become a republic.”
“How unfair!” cried Mrs. Strong, glancing deprecatingly at her son.
“Then, Miss Strong, you don’t approve of foreign aristocrats?” asked the
count gently, smiling at Kate in a confiding way.
“Indeed I do,” she returned, looking defiantly at Ned. “We should be very
dull in our set, you know, without them.”
“But you don’t take them _au sérieux_?” asked the count, anxious to stand
on solid ground.
“Indeed we don’t,” cried Kate. “We marry them, you know.”
Count Szalaki looked at his host in a puzzled way, and Mr. Strong smiled
benignantly.
“I think I told you on the steamer, count,” remarked Mr. Strong, “that
you would find it easier to understand our political institutions than
our American girl, did I not?”
Count Szalaki looked at Kate, an expression of admiration in his eyes
that savored not at all of boldness. “I think,” he said, “that I shall
take your politics for granted and attempt the solution of the greater
puzzle.”
“Take my advice and don’t do it, Count Szalaki,” cried Ned. “Our politics
are laughable, but our American girl is—is——”
“Is what, Ned?” asked Kate, with mock cordiality.
“Is dangerous,” answered her brother. “You see, count, you come here
several years too late. When I was young,” he continued, smilingly, “that
is, about two years ago, we were not under the depressing influence of
the New Woman. But now it is different. The New Woman——”
Count Szalaki’s mobile face bore an expression of bewilderment.
“Pardon me,” he exclaimed. “I am what you call—puzzled. I have not heard
that expression heretofore. What do you mean by the New Woman?”
“Don’t speak, Ned,” cried Kate, imploringly. “Let me tell Count Szalaki
what the New Woman is.”
“That is better, Ned,” remarked Mr. Strong, diplomatically. “It would be
unfair for the count to get your definition first.”
“I really think,” put in Mrs. Strong, anxiety in her voice, “that we
ought to change the subject.”
Count Szalaki glanced at her with a mournful smile on his lips and a
pleading glance in his eloquent eyes.
“But, Mrs. Strong, you must take pity on me. Remember, I am only a
barbarian. In my country, you know, we go very slowly. We cling to old
forms, old customs, old ideas. That is why I came over here. I wished to
broaden my mind and to keep in touch with the progress of the age.”
“Then there are no advanced women in Rexania?” asked Ned, courteously.
Count Szalaki seemed to wince as the name of his fatherland was brought
into the discussion. Kate afterward said that he actually turned pale.
“I can hardly say that,” answered their guest, rather sadly, as
it seemed. “There are women there who are discontented with our
institutions, who are desirous of changes in all directions. I was only
a boy at the time of the great outbreak in my country, ten years ago,
but I remember that among the rioters were many women. One woman led a
party of malcontents who attacked the palace. The guards were preparing
to shoot her, when I saw what they were about to do and ordered them to
lower their guns. Five years later, I was thrown from my horse while
hunting in a forest, not far from Rexopolis, and broke my arm. I was
carried to a hut in the woods, and an elderly woman very gently cared
for me until help arrived from the palace. Before they took me away,
she confided to me that she was the rebel who had led the attack on the
palace and whose life I had saved. She became a loyal subject from the
moment I gave the order that saved her life. She is now in the employ of
the king, and is doing good service in keeping him informed of the doings
of those who plot against the throne.”
An expression of surprise had crossed the faces of the diners at their
guest’s tale.
“Pardon me,” remarked Ned, as the count ceased to speak, “but do you live
in the palace at Rexopolis?”
If Count Szalaki felt any annoyance at his own loquacity he controlled
it successfully. The influence of his surroundings had made him quite
forget, for the time being, that he was hiding behind an incognito, and
that ordinary prudence demanded that he should keep his secret. With a
strong effort, he succeeded in suppressing all signs of dismay at his
unguarded recklessness. His life had tended to make him diplomatic, but
his nature was frank and confiding, and he was very sensitive to his
environment. “Surely,” he thought, “these hospitable, kindly, democratic
people are not of a suspicious character.” The thought reassured him,
and he said:
“I have a relative near the throne, you know. I sometimes spend several
weeks with him at the palace.”
“Then you know the king?” cried Kate, interestedly. “I have read so much
about him. And the crown prince? Is he as handsome as the newspapers say
he is?”
It was an embarrassing question, and the prince drank a half-glass of
champagne before answering his fair _vis-à-vis_.
“I may be prejudiced in his favor,” he said, at length, “but he is young
and in good health, and, I think, pleasing to the eye.” Then he added,
hurriedly, “But I am here to learn all about this country, not to talk
about my own. Tell me, is Chicago far from New York?”
The conversation gradually drifted into safer channels, and Count Szalaki
had begun to feel that his indiscretion had given him the only nervous
shock that he would experience during the evening, when the butler
approached the guest’s chair and said, apologetically:
“Pardon me, monsieur, but this note has just been presented at the door
by a man who says that it must reach you at once.”
Count Szalaki’s face flushed and then turned very pale. His hand trembled
slightly as he took the envelope from the outstretched tray. It bore the
name he had chosen for his incognito, and in the corner were written, in
the Rexanian dialect, the words “Important and immediate.”
“Will you forgive me,” said the count, glancing at Mrs. Strong, “if I
open this at once? There seems to be some mystery about it.”
His hostess smiled and bowed, and the youth opened the missive and
read the following startling sentences, written, like the words on the
envelope, in the purest Rexanian:
“YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESS,—A great danger threatens you. But trust
to us. We are your friends. Dismiss your carriage on leaving
the house, and walk down the avenue. Two men will join you who
love you and your house. We are under oath to guard you from
harm, and take this way to warn you. In the name of Rexania, be
prudent.”
The letter was unsigned, and an expression of consternation and
perplexity rested on the prince’s face as he reread the note and then
carefully inserted it in a pocket of his waistcoat.