"What's to be done, then?"
"It's very simple," she rejoined. "Give me the Golden Key. You'll be king no longer, but you'll have no responsibilities or anxieties."
"That won't be much fun for me," replied Cedric. "Besides, what will you do with it?"
"The right thing. I'll give it to the Crown Princess, the rightful heir. That will save the country a general election, and fairy tranquillity will reign once more."
"Why did you warn me not to part with it? And now you ask me for it!"
"I wanted to get it myself as soon as you would give it up, so that I might deliver it to my dear friend, who will become a queen like me. Then she can choose her husband; and, after being her bridesmaid, I suppose I shall be married too."
"Will you marry me?" asked Cedric bluntly.
"Why, you'd have to live on honey!" replied the Gossamer Queen, with a smile, half sweet, half malicious. Cedric turned it over in his mind, but not for long.
"Give me the key," she begged coaxingly.
"Yes—but," argued the boy, "it's worth a lot, you know: I wouldn't so much mind swopping it; but——"