t the King of Euralia had won, at the very
moment when he lay stretched on the ground by a mortal thrust from his
adversary.

The King turned to his swords again.

"Well, anyway, I'm going to be sure of _mine_," he said. "Hyacinth,
haven't you _any_ idea which it is?" He added in rather a hurt voice,
"Naturally I left the marking of my swords to _you_."

His daughter examined the swords one by one.

"Here it is," she cried. "It's got 'M' on it for 'magic.'"

"Or 'Merriwig,'" said the Countess to her diary.

The expression of joy on the King's face at his daughter's discovery
had just time to appear and fade away again.

"You are not being very helpful this morning, Countess," he said
severely.

Instantly the Countess was on her feet, her diary thrown to the
floor--no, never thrown--laid gently on the floor, and herself, hands
clasped at her breast, a figure of reproachful penitence before him.

"Oh, your Majesty, forgive me--if your Majesty had only asked me--I
didn't know your Majesty wanted me--I thought her Royal Highness----
But _of course_ I'll find your Majesty's sword for you." Did she
stroke his head as she said this? I have often wondered. It would be
like her impudence, and her motherliness, and her---and, in fact, like
her. _Euralia Past and Present_ is silent upon the point. Roger
Scurvilegs, who had only seen Belvane at the unimpressionable age of
two, would have had it against her if he could, so perhaps there is
nothing in it.

"There!" she said, and she picked out the magic sword almost at once.

[Illustration: _"Try it on me," cried the Countess_]

"Then I'll get back to my work," said Hyacinth cheerfully, and left
them to each other.

The King, smiling happily, girded on his sword. But a sudden doubt
assailed him.

"Are you sure it's the one?"

"Try it on _me_," cried the Countess superbly, falling on her knees
and stretching up her arms to him. The toe of her little shoe touched
her diary; its presence there uplifted her. Even as she knelt she saw
herself describing the scene. How do you spell "offered"? she
wondered.

I think the King was already in love with her, though he found it so
difficult to say the decisive words. But even so he could only have
been in love a week or two; a fortnight in the last forty years; and
he had worn a sword since he was twelve. In a crisis it is the old
love and not the greater love which wins (Roger's, but I think I agree
with him),