A Prince to Order

officer insisted that it was advisable for them to avoid as much as possible the public eye, the trio dined in a cabinet particulier on the se

e valiantly to smile at Lindenwald's essays at wit and to respond with some animation to Grey's less jocose bu

ied her three or four-and-99twenty, but he was satisfied now that sh

was more beautiful. In the death-chamber Grey had seen her sombre-robed and had pronounced her rarely lovely, and now in raiment immaculately snowy she was equally alluring. Her expression was naturally pensive and her recent sorrow had given to her big, deep-set

gnac over his coffee, "if you would take a trip with me tomorrow into the country. We will100

athered on Lindenwald's brow,

e interjected. "It would perhaps be safer

ied, decisively. "I feel that

e animation than she had previously shown. "Let us go to Ver

d, lighting a cigarette, while Lindenwald bru

the evening in a drowsiness that he could not shake off. For a while he dozed in a chair by an open window, but when the clock

s. At length sleep forsook him altogether, and he lay quite wide awake peering into the darkness in an effort to distinguish objects. But the night was very black and the room was enveloped in a pall of ink, save where the reflection fr

footsteps than they ceased, and the sound was succeeded by a muffled, metallic clicking from the direction of his door. With Lindenwald's warning102 in mind he had turned the key in the lock before retiring, and he recalled this now with a sense of satisfied security; but even as he did so he

ht be deceived. Quickly a hand went to the cord loops at either side of the casements and dropped the curtains, and now the room was devoid of even the dim illumination from the street lamps. Then aga

oach ceased and the suspense grew maddening. The man had evidently halted in the centre of the room. Then there came the faintest tinkle of glass touched to glass, so faint that the ticking of the clock made question whether it was not imagination; and then the stea

is feet in a flash, Grey made haste to follow up his advantage. His foot touched his104 fallen assailant and he flung his full weight down upon him, groping wildly in the dark to find his arms and pinion them. But the fellow wriggled like a worm-twisting agilely, squirming from under his clutch-and his arms evaded capture. Locked in a desperate embrace they ro

ges and Grey was breathing hard. The noise they were making, as they rose and fell and overturned furniture, was thunderous. Each moment Grey expected the house would be awakened and assistance would arrive. Perspiration was105 pouring from h

faintness swept over him, and then he felt his antagonist slipping sinuously from under him and he grabbed wildly for a fresh hold. He caught a wrist and tried to cling to it, but the teeth were cutting to the bone, grinding on the joint, and the wrist slid through his grasp

d to his feet and sought in the darkness for a window. Presently the touch of the curtains rewarded him. He thrust them frantically aside, pushed open

e deliberation decided to investigate the cause of the disturbance, found him pale and e

s happened? Have you tried to kill yourself? Oh, it i

hich depended from the ceiling in the centre of the room turned107 full on, he turned them off, opened the other window and t

y finger a biting. He had teeth like a saw and jaws like a vise. His original idea was asphyxiation, I suppose. He fancied I was a

ine, Herr Arndt, that he came?" Joha

essional when a fellow unlocks your door with a p

face, Herr Arndt? You

hann, and I cannot

remained hidden or have entered through some unbarred window in the rear of the hotel, probably escaping by the same means. Having made his report Johann bathed and bound Grey's finger, drew a bath for him, got out clean nightwear, remade the bed, and, just as the clock struck the half-hour aft

c device was to Grey unfamiliar, but it would be a comparatively easy matter to learn to what family it belonged. Indeed, he had a vague recollection of having noticed a ring of this pattern on the little finger of Baron von Einhard's ungloved hand the afternoon before in the hotel reading-room; but the pattern was not uncommon, and- but it was preposterous to fancy that a man of his pos

worn by no one save the Baron himself. He was for putting the matter in the hands of the police and thus avoiding future dangers, but after a little deliberation he realised that such a course would be impracticable. For the present it was absolutely necessary, he

mission, nor had he once so much as intimated to him that he knew him as other than Herr Max Arndt. That he was a crown prince en route to the bedside of his dying sire Captain Lin

ring for a little. I may run across von Einhard, and I should like t

which he could not d

placing it upon his finger; and Lindenw