th, a contradictory smile in her eyes: "I shall
rejoice more if you do not lose your head afterwards."

"_Double entendre_?"

"Not at all."

"I thought, perhaps, you referred to an unhappy plight that already
casts its shadow before," he said boldly. "I may lose everything else,
my dear Countess, but _not_ my head."

"I believe you," she said, strangely serious. "I shall remember that."

She knew this man loved her.

"Sit down, now, and let us be comfy. We are quite alone," she added
instantly, a sudden confusion coming over her. "First, will you give me
that box of candy from the table? Thank you so much for sending it to
me. How in the world do you manage to get this wonderful New York candy
all the way to Graustark? It is quite fresh and perfectly delicious."

"Oh, Fifth Avenue isn't so far away as you think," he equivocated. "It's
just around the corner--of the world. What's eight or nine thousand
miles to a district messenger boy? I ring for one and he fetches the
candy, before you can wink your eye or say Jack Robinson. It's a
marvellous system."

He watched her white teeth set themselves daintily in the rich nougat;
then the red lips closed tranquilly only to open again in a smile of
rapture. For reasons best known to himself, he chose not to risk losing
the thing he had vowed not to lose. He turned his head--and carefully
inspected the end of his cigarette. A wholly unnecessary precaution, as
any one might have seen that it was behaving beautifully.

Her eyes narrowed ever so slightly as she studied his averted face in
that brief instant. When he turned to her again, she was resting her
head against the back of the chair, and her eyes were closed as if in
exquisite enjoyment of the morsel that lay behind her smiling lips.

"Are you enjoying it?" he asked.

"Tremendously," she replied, opening her eyes slowly.

"'Gad, I believe you are," he exclaimed. She sat up at once, and caught
her breath, although he did not know it. His smile distinctly upset her
tranquillity.

"By the way," he added, as if dismissing the matter, "have you forgotten
that on Tuesday we go to the Witch's hut in the hills? Bobby has
dingdonged it into me for days."

"It will be good fun," she said. Then, as a swift afterthought: "Be sure
that the bodyguard is strong--and true."

CHAPTER VII

AT THE WITCH'S HUT

The next morning, before setting forth to consult the minister of police
at the Tower, he called up the