rium,' Aribert replied; 'at least not
about yourself. I knew about this projected loan before I saw you in
Ostend.'

'Who told you?' demanded Eugen fiercely.

'Then you admit that you are trying to raise a loan?'

'I admit nothing. Who told you?'

'Theodore Racksole, the millionaire. These rich men have no secrets from
each other. They form a coterie, closer than any coterie of ours. Eugen,
and far more powerful. They talk, and in talking they rule the world,
these millionaires. They are the real monarchs.'

'Curse them!' said Eugen.

'Yes, perhaps so. But let me return to your case. Imagine my shame,
my disgust, when I found that Racksole could tell me more about your
affairs than I knew myself. Happily, he is a good fellow; one can trust
him; otherwise I should have been tempted to do something desperate when
I discovered that all your private history was in his hands. Eugen, let
us come to the point; why do you want that million? Is it actually
true that you are so deeply in debt? I have no desire to improve the
occasion. I merely ask.'

'And what if I do owe a million?' said Prince Eugen with assumed valour.

'Oh, nothing, my dear Eugen, nothing. Only it is rather a large sum to
have scattered in ten years, is it not? How did you manage it?'

'Don't ask me, Aribert. I've been a fool. But I swear to you that the
woman whom you call "the lady in the red hat" is the last of my follies.
I am about to take a wife, and become a respectable Prince.'

'Then the engagement with Princess Anna is an accomplished fact?'

'Practically so. As soon as I have settled with Levi, all will be
smooth.

Aribert, I wouldn't lose Anna for the Imperial throne. She is a good and
pure woman, and I love her as a man might love an angel.'

'And yet you would deceive her as to your debts, Eugen?'

'Not her, but her absurd parents, and perhaps the Emperor. They have
heard rumours, and I must set those rumours at rest by presenting to
them a clean sheet.'

'I am glad you have been frank with me, Eugen,' said Prince Aribert,
'but I will be plain with you. You will never marry the Princess Anna.'

'And why?' said Eugen, supercilious again.

'Because her parents will not permit it. Because you will not be able to
present a clean sheet to them. Because this Sampson Levi will never lend
you a million.'

'Explain yourself.'

'I propose to do so. You were kidnapped--it is a horrid word, but we
must use it--in Ostend.'

'True.'