I am not gypsy nor am I Hungarian; I am an East Indian. My family is
royal. We are of the Rajpoot tribes called Ranas. My father once ruled
Roorbunder."

Lora was amazed. A king's son, a Rana of Roorbunder! She became very
sympathetic. Again she urged him to sit down.

"My nation never sits before a woman," he proudly answered.

"But I will sit beside you," she coaxed, pushing him to a corner. He
resisted her and went to the window. Lora again joined him. The man
piqued her. He was mysterious and very unlike Mr. Steyle--poor,
sentimental Clarence, who melted with sighs if she but glanced at him;
and then, Clarence was too stout. She adored slender men, believing that
when fat came in at the door love fled out of the window.

"They put me in a circus at Buda-Pesth," remarked Arpad Vihary, as if he
were making a commonplace statement about the weather.

She gave a little scream; he regarded her with Oriental composure. "In a
circus! You! Did you ride?"

"I cannot ride," he said. "I played in a cage all day."

"Because you were wild?" She then went into a fit of laughter. He was
such a funny fellow, though his ardent gaze made her blush. So blond and
pink was Lora that her friends called her Strawberry--a delicate
compliment in which she delighted. It was this golden head and radiant
face, with implacably blue eyes, that set the blood pumping into Arpad's
brain. When he looked at her, he saw sunlight.

"Do you know, you absurd prince, that when you played the Czardas the
other night I seemed to see a vision of a Hungarian prairie, covered
with fighting centaurs and satyrs! I longed to be a _vivandiere_ among
all those fauns. You were there--in the music, I mean--and you were big
Pan--oh, so ugly and terrible!"

"Pan! That is a Polish title," he answered quite simply.

"Stupid! The great god Pan--don't you know your mythology? Haven't you
read Mrs. Browning? He was the god of nature, of the woods. Even now, I
believe you have ears with furry tips and hoofs like a faun."

He turned a sickly yellow.

"Anyhow, why did they put you in a cage? Were you a wild boy?"

"They thought so in Hungary."

"But why?"

He stared at her sorrowfully, and was about to empty his soul; but she
turned away with a shudder.

"I know, I know," she whispered; "your hands--they are like the hands
of--"

Arpad threw out his chest, and Lora heard with a curiosity that became
nervous a rhythmic wagging sound, like velvet bruised by