a
haze. "Well, you have remarkable eyes. However, let us talk of a more
interesting subject; for instance, yourself. You, too, love adventure,
that is, if I interpret the veil rightly."

"Yes; I like to see without being seen. But, of course, behind this love
of adventure which you possess, there is an important mission."

"Ah!" he thought; "you are not quite sure of me." Aloud, "Yes, I came
here to witness the comic opera."

"The comic opera? I do not understand?"

"I believed there was going to be trouble between the duchy and the
kingdom, but unfortunately the prima donna has refused the part."

"The prima donna!" in a muffled voice. "Whom do you mean?"

"Son Altesse la Grande Duchesse! 'Voici le sabre de mon pere!'" And he
whistled a bar from Offenbach, his eyes dancing.

"Sir!--I!--you do wrong to laugh at us!" a flash from the half-hidden
eyes.

"Forgive me if I have offended you, but I--"

"Ah, sir, but you who live in a powerful country think we little folk
have no hearts, that we have no wrongs to redress, no dreams of conquest
and of power. You are wrong."

"And whose side do you defend?"

"I am a woman," was the equivocal answer.

"Which means that you are uncertain."

"I have long ago made up my mind."

"Wonderful! I always thought a woman's mind was like a time-table,
subject to change without notice. So you have made up your mind?"

"I was born with its purpose defined," coldly.

"Ah, now I begin to doubt."

"What?" with a still lower degree of warmth.

"That you are a woman. Only goddesses do not change their
minds--sometimes. Well, then you are on the weaker side."

"Or the stronger, since there are two sides."

"And the stronger?" persistently.

"The side which is not the weaker. But the subject is what you English
call 'taboo.' It is treading on delicate ground to talk politics in the
open--especially in Bleiberg."

"What a diplomat you would make!" he cried with enthusiasm. Certainly
this was a red-letter day in his calendar. This adventure almost
equalled the other, and, besides, in this instance, his skin was dry; he
could enjoy it more thoroughly. Who could this unknown be? "If only you
understood the mystery with which you have enshrouded yourself!"

"I do." She drew the veil more firmly about her chin.

"Grant me a favor."

"I am talking to you, sir."

This candor did not disturb him. "The favor I ask is that you will lift
the corner of your veil; otherwise you w