"Aboard!" cried a guard, marveling that women could find so much to say at the very last moment.
"Well," said the Princess, "I hope to see you at dinner. If not, in Delgratz."
Joan took good care that no one except her maid and an attendant saw her again that evening. She felt bruised and buffeted as though she had been carried among rocks by some irresistible current. Even her mind refused to act. The why and the wherefore of events were dim and not to be grasped. Over and over again she regretted the impulse that led her to take this journey. Felix, as friend and artistic tutor, was invaluable; but in the guise of mentor for a young woman who had her own way to make in the world, and nothing more to depend on than her artistic faculties and a small income from a trust fund, he was a distinct failure. What would Alec think of it all? And what would Alec's mother say when her son told her that Joan Vernon was the woman he meant to marry?
So Joan grew miserable, and developed a headache, and wept a little over perplexities that were very real though she could not define them. And Felix dined alone, and smoked in dumb reverie, and when Prince Michael, warmed with wine and cheered by the knowledge that a wearisome journey was drawing to a close, unbent so far as to ask him to sing, the little man shook his head.
"You'll hear me singing in Delgratz, Monseigneur," he said. "I shall have something to think about then, and I sing to think, just as you live to eat. At present, there isn't a note in the box. Now, if madame can spare you, just sit down there, and you and I will talk of old times. For instance, poor Amélie Constant—she died the other day——"
"Ah, bah!" growled Michael. "That is not interesting. Old times of that sort generally mean times one would rather forget. Au 'voir, M'sieur Poluski. We shall meet across the Danube. If your principles permit, come and see me at court."
"My principles carry me into strange company, Monseigneur," said Felix gravely.