The Count was not slow to take advantage of his permis de circuler; his coal-black horses and coach were soon a familiar spectacle in the streets of Eswareinmal, where he had discovered the delights of promiscuous shopping. He ordered a self-supplying dinner-table of the best quality—to be paid for by monthly instalments—from the Astrologer Royal, with whom he struck up a sort of friendship. Nor did he neglect to avail himself of his general invitation to the Palace, where he dropped in so frequently as almost to justify Clarence's prediction. Queen Selina gave him occasional hints that she had not expected him quite so often, but hints were thrown away on the Count's ingenuous nature—he seemed to take it for granted that he was always welcome.
Princess Edna certainly never discouraged his visits. She had been struck from the first by his great stature and powerful physique, which were just what she imagined that Nietzsche's ideal Superman would possess. It has already been mentioned that she had been attending lectures on the Nietzschean philosophy.
Those were the days—not so very long ago, though they seem remote enough now—when a certain class of high-browed and serious persons accepted works of modern German philosophers as containing a new gospel which none who desired intellectual freedom, enlightenment, and efficiency could afford to neglect. The theories of "the Will to Power" and of Might being equivalent to Right are already hopelessly discredited in this country by recent exhibitions of the way in which they work out in practice. But it was not so then, and Edna, who liked to feel that she was one of the elect and in the advance guard of Culture, readily imbibed as much of the Nietzschean doctrine as could be boiled down for her in a single lecture. She would not, of course, have thought of regulating her own actions on such principles, any more than, in all probability, did their author himself. But she was very anxious to see some one else do so, and the young Count seemed to have been formed by Nature for Nietzsche's typical "Blond Beast," if he only chose to divulge his possibilities. Unfortunately, he did not seem even to suspect them; he remained quite oppressively mild and amiable. She very nearly gave him up in despair once when he timidly presented her with a pair of mittens which he had knitted for her himself. However, a day came when she saw him under a less discouraging aspect.
They were at lunch, to which he had invited himself as usual, and Ruby had asked her brother how it was that in all his hunting expeditions he had never managed to slay a dragon.
"Never saw one to slay, Kiddie," he replied. "They seem scarce about here."
The Court Chamberlain, from behind the King's chair, took it upon himself to explain that there were no longer any dragons in existence, the few that remained having been exterminated by the late King's orders.
"Oh!" exclaimed Ruby, "I did so want to see a dragon! And now I never shall!"
"If you wish it, little Princess," said Count von Rubenfresser kindly, "you shall see mine."
"Yours!" cried Ruby, quite forgetting her dislike for him in her excitement. "Have you really got a dragon—a real live one?"
"A real live one—and almost full-grown," he replied. "My poor dear Father had a pair, but they were killed. Mine is the last of the breed. I discovered it myself when I was a child in a cave close to the castle. At that time it was only an egg."