She sat perfectly quiet for a bit.
"Let us hope," she said, at length; "let us hope that your eyes were trustworthy. Otherwise----"
"Yes?" I questioned.
"Otherwise our engagement must be announced or----"
"Yes?"
"You must give me the chance to cut you publicly, after which you must leave Dornlitz."
Here was a mess, sure enough. Yet, I was in for it--as most fools usually are.
"Which shall it be?" I said gayly.
She leaned close and looked me in the eyes. And beside her winsome face I saw, in my mind"s eye, the Princess"s, too--but only for an instant. Then I took her hand again. She smiled sweetly, almost as sweetly as Dehra herself could do.
"Let us wait until we know if we were seen," she said.
I made a move to kiss her again, but she drew away.
"Not so, sir; that time you did not look," she said, and stepped out into the light. Then I took her back to Lady Radnor.
"Don"t be disconsolate, Major," she said, as we parted. "No one saw you--on the terrace."
I looked down at her gravely. "I am beginning to hope someone did," I said.
She shot a quick glance at me over her fan. "Are you tired of Dornlitz so soon?" she asked.
"I think I want to stay in Dornlitz," I answered.
"But the alternative, Major, the alternative."
"That is why I want to stay."
She smiled. "You did that very prettily," she said. "I shall forgive you the--the kiss."
"But if someone saw it?" I protested.
"You great stupid," she exclaimed, "no one did. Do you think I didn"t look?"
"Oh!" said I. "Oh!"
"Sometimes you men are very foolish," she sympathized.
I looked at her a bit in silence. "You have changed since America," I remarked.
"For the better?"
I shrugged my shoulders.
"That"s not nice of you," she said.
Then Courtney came up.
"Run along, Major," he ordered; "you"ve kept the Lady Helen over time."
She took his arm. "Please take me out on the terrace," she said. Then she smiled at me aggravatingly.
"Maybe our chairs are still vacant; better take Courtney to them," I said maliciously.
It was not quite fair, possibly; and she told me so with her eyes, though her lips smiled. I knew I had given her another score to settle.
VI
THE SIXTH DANCE
It was Colonel Bernheim who brought me the Princess"s commands for the dance; and the courteous way he did his office made me like him on the instant. And this, though there was a certain deference of manner that was rather suggestive.
The Princess was in the small room behind the throne and, when I was announced, beckoned me to her.
"Major Dalberg," said she, when I had made my bow, "I have ordered the band to play an American quickstep; will you dance it with me as it is done at your great school--West Point, is it not?"
It was done very neatly, indeed. No one of those present could have imagined there was any prior arrangement as to that particular dance.
I saw the King smile approvingly.
"Your Royal Highness honors my country and its army, but through a very unworthy representative, I fear," I said, as I gave her my arm. Then the music began.
I have very little recollection of that dance; but I do know that Dehra needed no instruction in our way of doing the two-step; she glided through it as naturally as a Point-girl herself. And, when I told her so, she shrugged her pretty shoulders and answered:
"You are not the first American attache, you know."
"Nor the last, either," I replied, and then held my peace, though I saw her hide a smile behind her roses.
"But you are the first that has been my cousin," she said sweetly,--and I succ.u.mbed, of course. Yet I was punished promptly, nevertheless, for at the throne she stopped and I led her back to the King.
"May I not have another dance later?" I asked.
She shook her head. "Don"t you think you have been already favored more than you deserve, cousin?"
"Yes," said I, "I do; that"s why I am encouraged to ask for more."
"What a paragon of modesty!" she mocked.
I pa.s.sed it by. "And the dance?" I asked.