“Would you do that, dear?” she asked, “do you really care enough for me to do that—to acknowledge me so before the world?”
“Yes, Madeline, I think I do,” he said, after a pause, that seemed to her perilously long. “It appears rather retributive that you, who came here, at my instance, to play the wife for the American, should thus have been put, by my own act, into a position where our friendship must be maintained sub rosa. You are quite too clear headed not to appreciate that now, at least, I may not openly parade our relations; to do so would be to end whatever chance I have with the Nobles. But once on the Throne and the power firm in my hand, and they all may go to the devil, and a duchess shall you be—if,”—pinching her cheek—“you will promise to stay away from Paris and the Rue Royale, except when I am with you.”
She wound her lithe arms around his neck, and drew his face close to hers.
“I promise,” she said presently, “I promise.... But what if you should miss the Crown?—you could not make me duchess then.”
“Why not, ma belle?” he asked, holding her arms close around his neck. “I shall still be a Duke, and you—la Duchesse de la main gauche.”
She could not suppress the start—though she had played for just such an answer, yet never thinking it would come—and Lotzen felt it, and understood.
“Did that surprise you, little one?” he laughed. “Well, don’t forget, if I miss the Throne, and live, I shan’t be urged to stay in Valeria—in fact, whatever urging there is, will likely be the other way.”
“Banished?” she asked.
He nodded. “Practically that.”
“Paris?”—with a sly smile upward.