y will have to choose their
heroes from bank presidents, and their heroines from lady lawyers and
girl politicians and type-writers. What a stupid world it will be
then!"

The next day brought the reception to the Hohenwalds; and Carlton,
entering the reading-room of the hotel on the same afternoon, found
Miss Morris and her aunt there together taking tea. They both looked
at him with expressions of such genuine commiseration that he stopped
just as he was going to seat himself and eyed them defiantly.

"Don't tell me," he exclaimed, "that this has fallen through too!"

Miss Morris nodded her head silently.

Carlton dropped into the chair beside them, and folded his arms with a
frown of grim resignation. "What is it?" he asked. "Have they
postponed the reception?"

"No," Miss Morris said; "but the Princess Aline will not be there."

"Of course not," said Carlton, calmly, "of course not. May I ask why?
I knew that she wouldn't be there, but I may possibly be allowed to
express some curiosity."

"She turned her ankle on one of the loose stones on the Acropolis this
afternoon," said Miss Morris, "and sprained it so badly that they had
to carry her--"

"Who carried her?" Carlton demanded, fiercely.

"Some of her servants."

"Of course, of course!" cried Carlton. "That's the way it always will
be. I was there the whole afternoon, and I didn't see her. I wasn't
there to help her. It's Fate, that's what it is--Fate! There's no use
in my trying to fight against Fate. Still," he added, anxiously, with
a sudden access of hope, "she may be well by this evening."

"I hardly think she will," said Miss Morris, "but we will trust so."

The King's palace and gardens stretch along one end of the public park,
and are but just across the street from the hotel where the Hohenwalds
and the Americans were staying. As the hotel was the first building on
the left of the square, Carlton could see from his windows the
illuminations, and the guards of honor, and the carriages arriving and
departing, and the citizens of Athens crowding the parks and peering
through the iron rails into the King's garden. It was a warm night,
and lighted grandly by a full moon that showed the Acropolis in
silhouette against the sky, and gave a strangely theatrical look to the
yellow house fronts and red roofs of the town. Every window in the
broad front of the palace was illuminated, and through the open doors
came the sound of music, an