t may come to that," she said, "if you will honestly open
your eyes."

"Then you cannot promise me the support of the Church?"

She shook her head as though that were the last thing possible.

"I am to be all alone?" His tone invited commiseration, while his brain
soared with the dreams of a hashish-eater.

"I think about three may be with you, not more," she said, letting him
down to earth again.

"Why are you so confident about me?"

Her gentle gray eyes met his with friendly understanding.

"When I found out who you were," she said, "I saw"--then she
hesitated--"I saw that you had the rare gift of doing naturally what one
would never expect."

"In what way?"

"To begin with, in coming here at all. And then you did things which, I
imagine, no prince ever did before, and did them quite easily--'for
fun,' I suppose you would say. Well, if you could do all that for fun,
what might you not do when you became serious? A man who doesn't mind
being laughed at--whatever his position--is very rare."

"Ah!" cried Max, "but now you are giving me more credit than I deserve.
You set me to do ridiculous things for you--ridiculous, I mean, in one
dressed as I was for fashion and not for use--I was aware of it; but
nobody was aware of me. When I come here into these poor streets, I am
so unexpected that nobody recognizes me. If they thought that they did,
they would not believe their eyes. In that alone there is a sense of
enlargement and liberty which those who have not to live in our position
can hardly realize. It was like holiday; I felt as though I had been let
loose."

"And so became more yourself?"

"I cannot say; but I was happy while I was here. Why did you send me
away?"

"For the same reason that I now ask you to come back. I wanted you to be
of use--independently."

"Yet here I am dependent upon you again."

"No; you have this in your own hands: it is your position."

"That secures the chairmanship? But am I at all likely to be accepted?"

"From what I hear, nobody suspects you of taking any great interest in
the life of the poor. They have therefore no reason to be afraid of
you."

"I see," said Max. "As a figure-head chairman I might even be valuable."

"Very, I have no doubt."

"Part of the game?"

"Royalty and Trade are supposed to be natural allies," remarked Sister
Jenifer.

Max was startled at her discernment. "Oh, but that is true!" he cried.
"How wonderful, then, that you should be a