"At any rate her headache is better," grinned von Bernhoff; and then we sat in silence until Bessie returned, laughing merrily.
"A most ridiculous mistake, Paul. I don’t know how we could be so stupid. It was Ellen singing--our maid, you know," she added to the others. "Aunt Charlotte opened the door to tell her to be quiet. She is very angry at having been woke up."
Then came another mishap. The two men were murmuring their obviously insincere regrets when Ellen entered and said the Prince von Graven wished to see me.
"Show him up," I said, with a sort of feeling that nothing mattered now.
Von Felsen gave such a leer of triumph that I could have kicked him. "He is, indeed, an ultimate friend of yours, Bastable. Two visits in one day"; and with that the two men went, meeting the Prince on the landing.
"I could almost cry with vexation," whispered Bessie.
"It’s too serious for tears, Bess. Was Althea coming down here?"
She nodded. "I was just in time to stop her."
"She might almost as well have come," I grunted. "You had better leave me alone with the Prince. Try and persuade Althea to make a bolt of it."
The interview with the Prince was very short. Eagerness to learn the result of my visit to Chalice had brought him together with the desire to tell me he had found out that the arrest was not ordered by the Kaiser, who knew nothing about it. I told him what had passed between Chalice and myself.
"I was afraid of it; but of course she must have her own way," he declared feebly.
"Do you think she has the right to ruin Fräulein Althea, then?"
"It is most perplexing, baffling. I do not see what to do."
"Not to tell the truth is simply cowardly," I said with some warmth.
"Herr Bastable!" and he drew himself up to his full height.
"To place one woman in danger merely for another woman’s caprice is cowardly, Prince von Graven. And you are chiefly responsible."
"Do you speak in this way with Fräulein Althea’s sanction?"
"On the contrary, she is all too willing to sacrifice herself."
"Then it is scarcely pertinent to the matter."
"Pertinent or impertinent, it is the truth," I declared bluntly, disgusted at his indifference to Althea’s welfare.
"Are you seeking to force a quarrel upon me, sir?"