"Which is?"
"That you will maintain the most absolute, the most impenetrable secrecy concerning what you have seen this afternoon, including the very existence of such persons as myself and the King of Alsander."
"A reasonable and not unexpected request. Of course I give you my word of honour to keep silent. But reveal your next mystery, Signore!"
"What is a revealed mystery, except for the Church? All I care to let you know is that if you prove your mettle you shall be allowed to help in the regeneration of Alsander."
"A political scheme—is that it? But how am I to prove my mettle?"
"Wait and you will see."
"Tell me at least," rejoined Norman, "what is to be my immediate conduct. How am I to make the first step of this sublime journey?"
"Return to your lodging, rise, eat, walk, sleep, and flirt a little less than usual, and await events."
"Is that all?"
"Not quite all. I have another very fanciful request to make. Are you what the ancients call a good hypocrite, that is to say, an accomplished actor? For there is a delicate piece of acting which I would like you to perform. I want you by gradual degrees to raise a little mystery about yourself. I want you to insinuate with a hint here and a whisper there that you are a personage, a man with a past, a nobleman in disguise, at all events not quite what you seem. Let the honest folk you dwell with begin to imagine that there is some secret about your arrival in Alsander."