"Really? I wonder whether you will lend it to me?"
"I am sorry—it is in Vienna." And after an instant's pause, she ventured, "What, if it isn't indiscreet to inquire, do you wish to look up?"
"I wish to look up a lady—a dream lady—a lady who walks in beauty like the night of cloudless climes—and whose pocket-handkerchiefs are embroidered with the initials M.D., in a cypher, under a princely crown."
"I should think," said Maria Dolores, considering, "that she would probably be a member of one of the mediatised princely houses. But if you have nothing more than her initials to go by, you would find it difficult to trace her in the Almanach de Gotha."
"No doubt," said John. "But to a man of spirit a difficulty is a challenge."
"Do you make a practice," asked she, "of appropriating people's handkerchiefs?"
"Certain people's—yes," unblushing, he promptly owned.
"M.D. under a princely crown, I think you said?" she mused. "It occurs to me that Maria Dolores of Zelt-Neuminster's pocket-handkerchiefs might be so embroidered."
"Ah?" said John. "Zelt-Neuminster? That would be a daughter of the man who owns this Castle?"
"No, she is a sister of the man who owns this Castle."