eneral's head. I implore you'--he lured her with
the dimple of a lurking smile--'do not seriously blame your afflicted
senior, if we are to differ. I am vastly your elder: you instil the
doubt whether I am by as much the wiser of the two; but the father of
Harry Richmond claims to know best what will ensure his boy's felicity.
Is he rash? Pronounce me guilty of an excessive anxiety for my son's
welfare; say that I am too old to read the world with the accuracy of
a youthful intelligence: call me indiscreet: stigmatize me unlucky; the
severest sentence a judge'--he bowed to her deferentially--'can utter;
only do not cast a gaze of rebuke on me because my labour is for my
son--my utmost devotion. And we know, Miss Ilchester, that the princess
honours him with her love. I protest in all candour, I treat love as
love; not as a weight in the scale; it is the heavenly power which
dispenses with weighing! its ascendancy...'

The squire could endure no more, and happily so, for my father was
losing his remarkably moderated tone, and threatening polysyllables.
He had followed Janet, step for step, at a measured distance, drooping
toward her with his winningest air, while the old man pulled at her arm
to get her out of hearing of the obnoxious flatterer. She kept her long
head in profile, trying creditably not to appear discourteous to one who
addressed her by showing an open ear, until the final bolt made by the
frenzied old man dragged her through the doorway. His neck was shortened
behind his collar as though he shrugged from the blast of a bad wind. I
believe that, on the whole, Janet was pleased. I will wager that,
left to herself, she would have been drawn into an answer, if not an
argument. Nothing would have made her resolution swerve, I admit.

They had not been out of the room three seconds when my aunt Dorothy was
called to join them. She had found time to say that she hoped the money
was intact.

CHAPTER LII. STRANGE REVELATIONS, AND MY GRANDFATHER HAS HIS LAST OUTBURST

My father and I stood at different windows, observing the unconcerned
people below.

'Did you scheme to bring Prince Hermann over here as well?' I asked him.

He replied laughing: 'I really am not the wonderful wizard you think me,
Richie. I left Prince Ernest's address as mine with Waddy in case the
Frau Feld-Marschall should take it into her head to come. Further
than that you must question Providence, which I humbly thank for its
unfail