Jeneski was to be overthrown because two women hated him; the destiny of a people was to be changed, the course of history altered, to gratify their vengeance.
Ah, well, that had happened a thousand times; women were always altering the course of history to suit their whims or their passions; damming it up, throwing it into strange channels....
Or perhaps it was only his too-fervid imagination magnifying a chance remark. Myra Davis certainly did not look like a girl to seek adventure, to court disaster. At any rate, whether or not she had been deserted once, she was not being deserted twice. Presently she would be a princess, and after that queen-regent. Her son would be a king—the first king in history to be born of an American woman. That, also, would alter its course!
M. Noblemaire’s voice droned on, and each of them sat and listened and dreamed his dream; and Mrs. Davis’s, perhaps, was the sweetest of all—of a place on the steps of a throne....
Then suddenly the voice ceased and startled them awake.
“You find it correct, I trust, monsieur?” inquired M. Noblemaire of his fellow-notary.
“Yes, monsieur; in every detail.”
“Then we have only to sign,” said M. Noblemaire, and turned to his assistant for the pens, ink and blotter.
Selden was amused to see that the pens were long quills.
M. Noblemaire dipped one of them in the ink, picked up the paper, and approached the king.