"If Peter dies the throne will pass to the Princess Olga," explained the other. "She is the last of the line. Alexander is childless, and the princess is the only child of Peter. There is no one to dispute the throne with our beautiful Olga, who, it is said, is just as good as she is beautiful."
Fenton, who had suddenly sought a seat, did not say anything.
The musician rambled on:
"And a great heritage she will come into, this Queen Olga." The old Frenchman, fond as he was of the country from which he was an exile, had a very real regard for the welfare of the little land where he had lived so long. "When the war is over," his voice droned on, "Ironia will have added again the two provinces, Serania and Mulkovina. And I shall throw up my hat nearly as joyfully for that as I shall for the return into the victorious borders of La Belle France of Alsace-Lorraine." This last appeared to overcome him for a moment, and he paused before starting again.
"Ironia will then have a population of ten million, Monsieur Fenton. Think of that. She will become a power in Europe on a scale long looked forward to by her rulers. Then the young Queen will have a great country to reign over."
Fenton raised his head and clutched at a figurative straw. "But can a woman occupy the throne of Ironia?"
"But certainly. She will marry, of course. Indeed, even now they are saying on the street that a match will be made for our Queen with a prince of Serbia. It would be a fine stroke." The Frenchman mooned on while Fenton sat dumbfounded. This old man was calmly and unwittingly puncturing the bubbles of happiness that had engrossed the Canadian's attention since the romantic episode of the hills. "It would cement once again the Balkan confederacy. Some of the glory of the past would be theirs, and more glory than the past ever knew."
"Supposing the princess were already married, though?" said Fenton slowly and in a strained tone.
"Eh?" The old Frenchman opened his eyes sharply. "A—what you call—morganatic marriage?"
"No," said the other impatiently. "Supposing that the princess, not expecting to be Queen of Ironia, had married someone quietly—not expecting to be Queen," he repeated, as if to urge to himself and the old man every possible means of exit from this cul-de-sac that, for the first time, he realised he had landed in. "What then?"