Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-05-11

say 1t was time of inaction, yet we
were ever alert in our guard over the person
of the prince. The villains who lurked
watchful, somewhere in the throngs that
peopled the great city. should lay no hand
upon him by fault of ours, should bring no
disaster to the crown of Novodnia.
He, poor gentleman. passed the days
moodily enough, in all faith, commonly In
the apartment of Colonel Won Altdorf in the
Avenue de PObservatoire, where admittance
was refused every one save those whom
Won Altdorf himself inspected from the
anteroom; sometimes with the others OF
us in Mallorys studio, which had grown
to be a meeting place, a sort of head
quarters. Indeed, we must sadly nave
disturbed poor Denis in his work-for
he still continued his connection with the
London paper and wrote his articles and
reviews as before The pittance he received
gave him fair living.
Daily the prince renewed his siege of Mac
KenZie for an interview and explanation
with the Princess Eleanor, and daily old
Mackenzie put him off with mot yet,
sir! Would you wreck everything? Walt
till she's stronger knew that Sir Gavin
dreaded the inevitable exposure as he had
never dreaded anything before. He felt
that the responsibility Of what we had done
rested most heavily upon himself, and he
shrank day by day from the storm that
must some time break, and day by day put
of the prince upon the old pretext, even
after he knew that the pretext was Of no
weight and that madame would never be
better able to bear the shock.
AS for the prince, he won our respect and
sincere pity in these days, If never our love.
We grew to see under his southern i'm
pulsiveness his quick temper and volatile
moods. the real man, honorable. true and
Sincere a soul too frail for the weight. Of
responsibility and power that hung upon
1t, nature too weak for the struggle Of
duty and love that swayed 1t. He loved
his countryindeed, at the end we had no
cause to doubt that-and above all else he
loved the woman who had been so strange
ly torn from him at the very altar steps.
But his will lacked the stern strength to
make choice between the two when
choice was demanded He would neither
stay at the post of duty nor throw I'D all
duties and responsibilities for love- Who
among US all shall condemn him? To some
the good God gives an iron will, a strength
to put aside temptation, but to others
heart whose claims will not be denied.
Be all this as it may, we grew fond of his
highness in those days, and filed with an
infinite pity for him that softened our first
disgust at his weakness He was simple
gentleman who should never have been
called to station which he hated and
which was far beyond his stature.
AS for Denis. he met the Princess Eleanor
each afternoon In the garden, save one day
when it rained, SO that being out of doors
was impossible, and the princess, seized
with a perverse whim that they should see
each other nowhere but in their walled
paradise, would not meet him at all, but
kept to her chamber, and only sent him a
letter, very thick in the envelope. Denis
spent the day over it, reading 1t again and
again, holding 1t in his hands when he did
not read. and lifting 1t to his face that he
might inhale the faint fragrance of the
paper. 1t was,-I think. her first written
word to him, and I know that he would
have fought for it with his life-such value