there is no sense in
asking me to chew the wretched fowl that proclaimed his downfall," he
muttered.

"Oh, Felix dear, please do tell me what has happened!" said Joan,
clasping her hands in real distress. "I received a letter from Alec this
morning. It was sent to me from my lodgings, and, what between that and
the extraordinary things in the newspapers, I think I am bewitched. Now
I am sure that you too have heard from him. Is it a telegram?"

"Yes," he said, "a message sent without wires; it came by one of those
underground currents that convulse an unconscious world, sometimes
agonizing mountains, at others perplexing a simple maid like yourself.
You see, Joan, all things conspire to draw you to Delgratz."

"I am not going!" she vowed, thereby giving Poluski the exact
information he needed; for his nimble brain was beginning to see the
connection between Alec's letter and Count Julius Marulitch's intense
desire to avail himself of Joan's skill as a copyist.

"You are, my dear," he said, dropping his bantering tone and looking her
straight in the eyes.

"How can such an absurdity be dreamed of?" she demanded breathlessly.

"Because it is a dream that will come true. Listen, now, and don't be
afraid, for these gray old trees of Barbizon have heard madder
whisperings than that you should become a Queen. It is in the natural
order of things that I, who gave my best years to devising the ruin of
Kings, should be chosen in my dotage to help in fixing a King firmly on
his throne. It is some sport of the gods, I suppose, a superhuman jest,
perhaps the touch of farce that makes tragedy more vivid, since even
that colossal Shakespeare of yours thought fit to lighten Hamlet by
introducing a comic gravedigger. Be that as it may, Joan, you are Alec's
Queen, and, as he cannot come for you it follows that you must go to
him. Shall I tell you why? You are necessary to him. It is decreed, and
you cannot shirk your lot. He knows it, and he has written to bid you
come. His enemies know it; but there is a kind of knowledge that leads
its votaries blindfold to the pit, and Alec's enemies are blindly
plotting now to send you to Delgratz and thus compass his ruin."

"Felix! What are you saying?"

"The truth, the simple truth. Not a whiff of metaphor or extravagance
about that statement, Joan. This morning a man came to me in the Louvre.
He was seeking you. He wants to pay you five thousand francs for a copy
of some blazoned daub t