"Mr. O'Mally makes a very good suggestion. It will be an adventure worth
recounting. I shall go as the princess. What sport with the country
gentlemen! This will be an adventure after one's own heart. Her Highness
commands! Will it not be delightful?"

Worth looked at O'Mally, who looked at Smith, who looked at Kitty; then
all four looked at La Signorina.

"Are you not lightening our trials by joking?" asked Worth dubiously.

"I am positively serious."

"Impossible! It would be nothing less than madness to fly in the face of
this stroke of luck."

"Call it madness, if you like. I shall go as the princess."

"But the authorities! It will be prison."

"I am sufficiently armed for any event. It all depends upon your
courage," with a veiled insolence calculated to make any man commit any
kind of folly.

"It is not a question of courage," replied O'Mally; "it's prudence."

"Prudence in an Irishman?" more insolent than ever.

"Oh, if you take that tone," said O'Mally, coloring, "why, the thing is
done. Henceforth I am your major-domo. No one can call me a coward."

"O'Mally!"

"That's all right, Worth," said O'Mally. "I wouldn't turn back now for
sixty-seven jails. You need not join."

"I shan't desert you in a strait like this," remarked Worth quietly.
"Only, I think La Signorina rather cruel to force such a situation upon
us, when it was entirely unnecessary. Put me against the
correspondence."

"If I wasn't flat broke," said Smith, "I'd bow out politely. But where
the grub-stake goes I must go. But I don't like this business a little
bit. Signorina, do tell us that it's a joke."

"Yes," cried Kitty, still in doubt.

"I repeat, I am perfectly serious."

"But the consequences!" protested Kitty, now terrified.

"Consequences? I shall find a way to avoid them."

"But supposing some one who knows the real princess happens along?" said
Worth, putting in his final argument.

"If I get into trouble of that sort, her Highness will help me out. I
thank Mr. O'Mally for his suggestion."

"Don't mention it," returned O'Mally dryly. Inwardly he was cursing his
impulsive Irish blood.

"It is agreed, then, that to-morrow we depart for Florence as the
Principessa di Monte Bianca and suite?"

Tears began to fill Kitty's eyes. To have everything spoiled like this!
La Signorina would land them all in prison.

"There's a legal side to it," Smith advanced cautiously. "The law may
not see the jest from your poi