"Are you won over yet?" she asked.
"Who may gainsay a princess?" said Paul. "But are you certain that my appointment will not give offence?"
"I reign over a divided realm. If I appoint a Pole I shall have the Muscovites against me; if I appoint a Muscovite I shall have the Poles against me. Therefore I will choose my secretary from neither party."
"In order to unite both against you," smiled Paul. "But I fear, Barbara, that I am ill-qualified for the post."
"So much the better, Paul, for it will be charming to be your instructress," she replied, delighted that he had accepted the appointment. "What will your sovereign say at losing a brave soldier?"
"The princess is now my sovereign."
"Nay, not your sovereign, Paul, but your equal."
She rose and walked to a buhl table on which rested a golden diadem, and returning with it, she placed it playfully upon his head.
"See how well it becomes you," she said, drawing him gently towards a mirror. "There! every inch a prince."
Paul smiled oddly at his reflection in the glass. He to wear the crown of Czernova! The idea seemed too fantastic to be entertained. For the last four and twenty hours he seemed to have been playing a rôle in some romantic opera rather than to have been living in the world of reality.