But Charlie Maxwell refused to say any more about it. He had had a good lesson and he was going to take it to heart. Meanwhile all was well that ended well, he said. It was a very delicious half hour that passed before a footman announced Miss Jessie Harcourt.
The girls looked wonderfully alike as they stood side by side and Maxwell was fain to admit it. He saw Jessie's eyes gleam and the colour come into her face as Ronald Hope entered. He advanced at once and shook him cordially by the hand.
"'Be you as pure as snow, and as chaste as ice, thou shalt not escape calumny,'" he quoted. "I know there was nothing wrong as far as you were concerned, Maxwell. And Lancing either. They tell me his gambling debts turned his mind, poor fellow. And there were no papers missing after all."
"Not as far as I am concerned," Maxwell said grimly. "The fellows at the club——"
"Consider that you have been infernally badly treated by a mob of newspaper gossips," said Ronald. "By the way, there is an exceedingly handsome apology in to-day's Mercury. Everybody is talking about it. I should let the matter stop there if I were you."
Everything fell out exactly as Lord Merehaven had predicted. The evening papers were full of the new Asturian affair. They were glad to find that Russia had been checkmated and that the appointment of Prince Alix was likely to give satisfaction. They also cherished the fact that King Erno was back in London and that he was looking very ill. The morning papers got their innings in due course with the announcement that ex-King Erno was dead, and that he had died in the night at General Maxgregor's rooms. Dr. Varney had given a certificate of death to the effect that his highness had succumbed to the shock following on his railway accident, and there was no more to be said. The body of the unfortunate prince was going to be embalmed and taken back to his country for burial. Count Gleikstein was puzzled and felt that he had been in some way outwitted, but there was the corpse of the king for him to see, and there, unfortunately for him, was Prince Alix apparently firmly seated on the throne of Asturia. It was impossible for the count at this juncture to hold any sort of communication with either Mazaroff or Countess Saens, seeing that they were both arrested and both had serious charges hanging over them. Russia would have to wait a further opportunity to gratify her designs upon Asturia.
"What will be the upshot of it all?" Ronald Hope asked Jessie as the two of them strolled in the gardens behind Merehaven House a week later. There had been a small dinner-party there and the ex-Queen of Asturia just back from the burial of her husband had been present. "Where will she end, Jessie?"
Jessie laughed and coloured as she replied to the question. There was nobody near so that she kissed Ronald.
"I hope she will end as happily as my trouble is going to end with you," the girl said softly. "I have seen quite enough of the queen to know where her heart is. I know the temptation that was placed on the shoulders of General Maxgregor that fateful night. He loves the ground that the queen walks on. And she knows it quite as well as I know that you love me, Ronald. She would have kept her secret so long as the throne was fairly under her. But that is all over, and henceforth Queen Margaret and Asturia will be strangers. She feels that she has beaten Russia and that the dynasty is safe with Prince Alix. It was a near thing, but between us we managed to win. Thenceforth the queen will be no more than a subject of King Edward here, and her happiness is in her own hands if she chooses to grip it."
Jessie's voice trailed off to a whisper, for at the same moment ex-Queen Margaret came out of the house down the lane with General Maxgregor by her side. They were talking very earnestly, and they passed by the side of the sundial where Jessie had stood not so many nights before waiting for the signal to come. The queen said something in a broken voice, her head dropped, she held out her hand to Maxgregor who carried it to his lips.