f. Considered as an
outlook in life, as the governing factor in a human being's existence, I
did not seem to myself brilliant or even satisfactory. I had at this
time remarkable forecasts of feelings that were in later years to be my
almost daily companions.

"And what shall your husband be like, Elsa?" asked the Duke, as his
little daughter sat on his knee and he played with her ringlets.

I was sitting by, and the Duke's eyes twinkled discreetly. The child
looked across to me and studied my appearance for some few moments. Then
she gave us a simple but completely lucid description of a gentleman
differing from myself in all outward characteristics, and in all such
inward traits as Elsa's experience and vocabulary enabled her to touch
upon. I learned later that she took hints from a tall grenadier who
sometimes stood sentry at the castle. At the moment it seemed as though
her ideal were well enough delineated by the picture of my opposite. The
Duke laughed, and I laughed also; Elsa was very grave and business-like
in defining her requirements. Her inclinations have never been obscure
to her. Even then she knew perfectly well what she wanted, and I was not
that.

By the indiscretion of somebody (the Duke said his wife, his wife said
the governess, the governess said the nurse) on the day before I went,
Elsa got a hint of her suggested future. Indeed it was more than a hint;
it was enough to entangle her in excitement, interest, and, I must add,
dismay. Children play with the words "wife" and "husband" in a happy
ignorance; their fairy tales give and restrict their knowledge. Cousin
Elizabeth came to me in something of a stir; she was afraid that I
should be annoyed, should suspect, perhaps, a forcing of my hand, or
some such manoeuvre. But I was not annoyed; I was interested to learn
what effect the prospect had upon my little cousin. I was so different
from the Grenadier, so irreconcilable with Elsa's fancy portrait.

"I'm very terribly vexed!" cried Cousin Elizabeth. "When it's all
so--all no more than an idea!"

"She's so young she'll forget all about it," said I soothingly.

"You're not angry?"

"Oh, no. I was only afflicted with a sense of absurdity."

Chance threw me in Elsa's way that afternoon. She was with her nurse in
the gardens. She ran up to me at once, but stopped about a yard from the
seat on which I was sitting. I became the victim of a grave, searching,
and long inspection. There was a roundnes