walked up to the
house, still in silence. For the first time since they had known each
other, a dark shadow lay between them. As soon as they reached the
verandah, however, Brockford placed his hand upon Max's shoulder.

"You and I have got to have a talk together before we go to bed
to-night," he said. "There are things that must be settled once and for
all."

"I am at your disposal, of course," Max replied, but not with too much
grace. "What is it you want to say to me?"

"There is nothing I _want_ to say to you," Brockford answered, with an
accent on the _want_. "It's what I feel I _must_ say, both in your
interests and my own. Don't think I am going to pry into your private
affairs. My sole desire is to help you, if I possibly can. It's a
delicate position for a man to be placed in; for, you see, I have only
my suspicions to go upon, and I may give you pain without intending it.
I think, however, that those suspicions are strong enough to bear the
weight of what I'm going to say to you. The picture you saw to-night
came to you as a painful surprise, did it not? And yet it did not
astonish me, for I had seen it before. That you were not best pleased to
be confronted with it, I gathered from your face, and, as I looked at
it, I remembered certain things you had let slip in your delirium. No!"
he cried, seeing that Max was about to speak, "let me finish before you
begin. I have a young friend, I might even go so far as to say, a dear
young friend, who came to me eighteen months ago, in rather an
extraordinary fashion. He had been in an English cavalry regiment, he
informed me; so, I reflected, had the Crown Prince of whom we have been
speaking. He informed me in my own dining-room, by accident I will
admit, that he had been a guest at Osborne; I believe the Crown Prince
enjoyed a similar honour; the latter, so report says, has black hair and
dark eyes, his height is about six feet one, and he is slimly built. If
I wanted to carry the coincidence further, I might add that, when my
friend, Max Mortimer, was ill, he spoke continually of a certain
beautiful princess. 'Paul loves her and I will not stand in his way,' he
cried. Now, strangely enough, the Crown Prince has an only brother whose
name is Paul. I happen to know this, because the very next morning,
while you were still lying at death's door, the newspapers announced the
fact that Prince Paul of Pannonia had been betrothed to the Princess
Ottilie, daughter of Pr