ighness at the Red Chateau. To the palace!"

Up the Strasse they raced, through the lower town to the upper, and down
the broad asphalt to the palace gates. The prince rushed his horse to
the very bars and shook them in his wild impatience.

"Ho! open, open!" he called.

Several cuirassiers lounged about. At the sight of these two hatless,
bedraggled men storming the gates, they ran forward with drawn swords
and angry cries. Lieutenant Scharfenstein was among them. At second
glance he recognized Maurice, who hailed him.

"Open, Lieutenant," he cried; "it is his Highness, Prince Frederick!"

The bars came down, the gates swung in.

"Go and sleep," said the prince to Maurice; "I will send an orderly for
you when the time comes." And with this he dashed up the driveway to the
main entrance of the palace, leaped from his horse and disappeared.

Maurice wheeled and drove leisurely to the Continental, leaving the
amazed cuirassiers gaping after him. He experienced that exuberance of
spirits which always comes with a delightful day dream. He forgot his
weariness, his bruises. To mingle directly in the affairs of kings and
princes, to be a factor among factors who surround and uphold thrones,
seemed so at variance with his republican learning that he was not sure
that all this was not one long dream--Fitzgerald and his consols, the
meeting with the princess, the adventures at Madame's chateau, the
duel with Beauvais, the last night's flight with the prince across the
mountains! Yes; he had fallen asleep somewhere and had been whisked away
into a kind of fairyland. Every one was in trouble just now, as they
always are in certain chapters of fairy tales, but all would end
happily, and then--he would wake.

Meanwhile the prince entered the palace and was proceeding up the grand
corridor, when a bared sword stayed his progress.

"Monsieur," said von Mitter, "you have lost your way. You can not enter
here."

"I?" a haughty, threatening expression on his pale face. "Are you sure?"

Von Mitter fell back against the wall and all but lost hold of his
saber. "Your Highness?" he gasped, overcome.

"Even so!" said the prince. "The archbishop! the Marshal! Lead me to
them at once!"

Von Mitter was too much the soldier not to master his surprise at once.
He saluted, clicked his heels and limped toward the throne room.
He stopped at the threshold, saluted again, and, in a voice full of
quavers, announced:

"His Highness Princ