urling a fan, "and it is cold, this
England of yours."

"Princess, to-night is warm!" expostulated Ware.

"Nevertheless I have had a fire made up," she answered, pointing with
her fan to the end of the room; "the landlord was so surprised."

"He no doubt considered it to be an eccentricity of Her Highness," said
Olga, with a laugh; "a cigarette, mother?"

The Princess took one languidly, and moved her chair closer to the fire.
The night--to Giles--was quite hot, and he could scarcely bear the
stifling heat of the room. Windows and doors were closed, and the fire
flamed up fiercely. Also some pastiles had been burnt by Olga, and added
a heavy, sensuous scent to the atmosphere. Ware could not help comparing
the room to the Venusberg, and the women to the sirens of that unholy
haunt. Which of the two was Venus he did not take upon himself to
decide.

"I am used to the tropics," explained the Princess, puffing blue clouds
of smoke. "I come from Jamaica; but I have been many years in Vienna,
and in that cold Hungary," she shivered.

"Ah, now I see, Princess, why you speak English so well," said Giles,
and he might also have added that he now guessed why she was so Eastern
in appearance and so barbaric in her taste for crude, vivid colors. She
had negro blood in her veins he decided, and Olga also. This would
account for the fierce temperament of the latter.

"I left Jamaica when I was twenty-two," explained the Princess, while
her daughter frowned. For some reason Olga did not seem to approve of
these confidences. "Prince Karacsay was travelling there. He came to my
father's plantation, and there he married me. I am sorry I did not marry
someone in Jamaica," she finished lazily.

"My dear mother," broke in her daughter petulantly, "you have always
been happy in Vienna and at the Castle."

"At the castle, yes. It was so quiet there. But Vienna, ach! It is too
gay, too troublesome."

"You don't like noise and excitement, Princess?"

She shook her imperial head with the gesture of an angry queen.

"I like nothing but rest. To be in a hammock with a cigarette and to
hear the wind bend the palms, the surf break on the shores. It is my
heaven. But in Hungary--no palms, no surf. Ach!" She made a face.

"You are different to Mademoiselle Olga here," said Ware, smiling.

"Quite different," cried Olga, with a gay laugh. "But I am like my
father. He is a bold hunter and rider. Ah, if I had only been born a
man! I love