own so very emphatically that she was to be left free and
treated without ceremony, that really I did not trouble to look after
her. Whenever she was here her Highness always mixed quite freely with
the students; I know that with some of them she had made friends. They
are far more likely to know what her plans were than I am."

Further inquiry in the direction thus indicated had to be carried on
elsewhere, since the students had now separated for the vacation; and
wherever inquiry was made the same stealthy secrecy had to be adopted;
nobody must be allowed to suppose that the Princess Royal of Jingalo was
missing. And so--on a sort of all-fours not at all conducive to
speed--the quest went on.

On the fifth day, however, some relief had arrived to reduce the
parental anxiety to bearable proportions. A letter, dropped from
nowhere, bearing the metropolitan postmark, came to the King's hands. It
gave only the barest, yet very essential information.

"Dearest papa," it ran, "I am quite well, and enjoying myself. I shall
be back in a fortnight."

News of the arrival of this letter was immediately conveyed to the
Constabulary Chief; and after three days of deep cogitation the absence
of all reference to the outrage and to the risk run by those near and
dear to her seemed to strike him as peculiar, and supplied him with what
hitherto the police had lacked--a clue. And after two more days of
strenuously directed search it bore fruit.

Late one afternoon the King was sitting at work in his study when his
Comptroller-General entered hastily and in evident excitement; for
though the King was then busily engaged in writing he presumed to
interrupt, not waiting for the royal interrogating glance to give him
his permission.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he said, in a tone of very urgent apology.

"Well, well?" said the King rather testily, for he did not like his
writing-hour to be thus disturbed, "what is it?"

"The Prime Minister wishes to see you, sir, on a matter of extreme
urgency."

The King had so long been pestered by ministers on matters which they
considered urgent and which he did not, that he had little patience for
such pleas, coming at the wrong time.

"What about?" he inquired curtly.

The Comptroller-General, who was supposed not to know, replied
discreetly but in a tone of veiled meaning, "Something in the Home
Department I believe, sir. Just now, while there is no chief secretary,
the Prime Minister him