“Yet, surely, Count, I’ve seen you somewhere since then, and very recently, too—where was it?”
Bigler feigned to think.—“One sees Your Highness so many times, it is difficult to remember the last ... on the Field of Mars, last Monday, wasn’t it?”
The Archduke shook his head. “No,” he said, “no; it was in the evening—I recall that very distinctly.” Then he looked with deliberate inference at the bandaged ear—“oh, I have it: it was at the De Saure’s; you were there when I came, and you left first and—rather hurriedly. It all comes back to me now. Surely, Count, you can’t have forgot such a pleasant evening!”
Bigler assumed a look of guileless innocence.
“It is not permitted to contradict Your Highness,” he answered, “but I may, I think, at least venture the truism:—what one has not remembered, one cannot forget.”
“Or restated, my dear Count, to be quite in point:—what is inconvenient to remember, is best denied.”
“Just as Your Highness will have it,” Bigler grinned, and impudently fingered his ear.
“And confidentially, Count,” said Armand smilingly, “while we are dealing in truisms, I give you these two:—‘every man’s patience has its limit,’ and, ‘who plays with fire gets burnt’—fatally.”
Bigler’s grin broadened.
“Is Your Highness the man with the patience or the man with the fire?” he asked.