uis Napoleon whispered of another throne in the building.
Whereupon _she_ began the study of Spanish; _she_ decided her
half hesitating spouse to accept, however loftily they both scorned the
adventurer who helped them to it.

Carlota, for so the natives called her, amiably greeted the Missourian.
She was a woman of tact, and though one Din Driscoll was for her as
impersonal a thing as some opportune event, yet events must be neatly
turned to account.

"His Majesty and I have discussed your presence in our country, sir,"
she began in English, "and feeling that he desires to see you again, I
requested M. Eloin to bring you to Cuernavaca."

"Why, thank you, ma'am," said Driscoll.

She all but reproved the form of address. But, for her at least, common
sense was beginning to prevail. The rigid court punctilio, largely of
her own enthusiastic designing, had gone hard with her. Her husband had
proved no more than consistent to the medieval revival. He was but true
to that old chivalry which distinguished between the divinely fair
damsel to be won and the mere woman won already. He was the monarch, she
his consort. Classifying others, the Empress found herself classified.
He was her liege, and she might not even enter his presence unannounced.
But how much happier was she in the blithe sailor prince who came
a-wooing, who wooed for love, in accordance with that same ancient
chivalry!

A princess of the Blood, of the House of Orleans, Charlotte had had that
nicest poise of good breeding, the kind that is unconscious. But here
among the Mexicans, she had to proclaim a superiority not taken for
granted, and the nice poise was gone. In her the generations--Henry IV.,
the Grand Monarch, and all of that stately line--in her they stooped.
And an element of sheerest vulgarity, as plebeian as a Jew's diamond,
crept in perforce. Poor tarnished escutcheon of Orleans! Poor princess
of the Blood, become menial with scouring it! She was weary. Over this
New World there floated too much of obscuring democratic dust. So she
allowed "ma'am," like a homely fleck, to settle unreproved on the
ancestral doorplate.

Driven to expediency for her very Empire's sake, she herself trampled on
the Ritual. Waiving all formalities, they would go and seek out His
Majesty. He must be somewhere in the gardens, perhaps beside the pond
with its fringe of deep shadows from the trees. There they expected to
find him, breathing the air of orange blossoms,