ncellor? Because, if you are--"

"Oh, I am practically certain!"

"Then, the more pieces in the puzzle which I fit together, the more
likely does it seem that your Leopold's Miss Helen Mowbray and my Miss
Jenny Brett are one and the same."

"Miss Jenny Brett?"

"Did you never hear the name?"

"If I have, I've forgotten it."

"Chancellor, you wouldn't if you were a few years younger. Jenny Brett
is the prettiest if not the most talented singer ever sent out from
Australia, the fashionable home of singers. She is billed to sing at
the Court Theater of Kronburg in a fortnight, her first engagement in
Rhaetia."

"You are right. It may well be that she's been having a game with
us--a game that we can prevent now, thank Heaven, from ending in
earnest."

"Oh, yes, we can prevent that."

"Your Royal Highness met the lady in your own country?"

"N-o. It was in Paris at first, but I'm afraid I induced her to accept
an engagement at home. We were great friends for a while, and really
she's a charming creature. I can't blame myself. Who would have
guessed that she'd turn out so ambitious? By Jove, I can sympathize
with Leopold. The girl tried to twist me round her finger, and I
verily believe fancied at one time that I would offer her marriage."

"It must be the same girl. And the Emperor _has_ offered her
marriage."

"What? Impossible! But--with the left hand, of course, though even
that would be unheard of for a man in his--"

"I swear to your Royal Highness that if he isn't stopped, he will
force her on the Rhaetian people as Empress."

"Gad! Little Jenny Brett! I didn't half appreciate her brilliant
qualities."

"Yet I would wager that she appreciated yours."

The Prince shrugged his shoulders. "I believe she really cared
something for me--a month ago."

"Then she still cares. You are not a man whom a woman can forget,
though pique or ambition may lead her to try. I tell you, frankly, I
believe that Providence sent your Royal Highness here at this moment,
and my best hopes are now pinned on you. You--and no one as well as
you--can save the Emperor for a nobler fate. Even when I supposed
you a stranger to this lady who calls herself Helen Mowbray, I
thought that, if you would consent to meet her and exercise your
fascinations, there might be hope of averting the danger from my
master. Now, I hope everything. I beg, I entreat, that your Royal
Highness will send up your name and ask the lady to see you with