"You can understand that we are strangers in this neighborhood, Americans," Polly defended more hotly. "But of course we should not have wandered in here without inquiring of some one whether or not we had the privilege. In the United States we know very little about game preserves and people are willing to have you enjoy the beauty of their forests. But we shall leave immediately and promise never to trouble you again."
"But that means that you have not forgiven me and I ask your pardon with all my heart. It is my pride, my great pleasure to have you consider my place worthy of your attention. Miss Ashton," the young foreigner now turned directly to Betty, "surely you can appreciate and pardon my mistake."
Neither of the other two girls had been paying any special attention to Betty, but at the stranger's surprising knowledge of her name they turned toward her at once. And both decided that they had never seen her look so pretty or so angry in her life. Apparently she had not spoken before because she had not been willing to trust herself. And Polly had a sudden sense of satisfaction in the knowledge that the Princess did not lose her poise and self-control in her anger, as she so invariably did.
"You ask us to understand and pardon your mistake," Betty now began quietly. "But suppose that the bullet which you fired so carelessly had killed my sister. Would you still have expected us to make the same answer? Of course we are just as much intruders upon your property as if we were men instead of American girls. But I presume that when you fired, thinking that we might be poachers, you would have been indifferent had you wounded one of us. For I believe in Germany it is the fashion for the soldiers who are intended for the defense of their country to have little respect for the lives of their countrymen."
This was a long and bitter speech for a young girl to have made. But remember that Betty Ashton had been living in Germany for the past two years at a time when the army had been frequently criticized and had suffered just as most travelers do from the rudeness of German officers upon the streets and in places of public amusement. Moreover, she had not yet recovered from her moment of fright over Esther and was annoyed at having their pleasure so destroyed.
Her accusation so surprised the young man to whom it was addressed that for a moment he did not reply. For evidently he did not often find himself obliged to be placed on the defensive side in a discussion and the position did not please him.
"I regret to have frightened you. And I had no intention of injuring any one," he remarked stiffly. "It was my plan to fire into the air, but I stumbled at the critical moment. However, I did not suppose that the shot came anywhere in your direction. And I am sorry that you should consider this but another instance of the lack of courtesy in His Majesty's officers."
There was an awkward pause. Betty was holding her big flowered hat pressed close against her white dress, her lips were scarlet and her face so pale that her gray eyes looked almost smoke-colored. The wind and the long walk had loosened her hair until it was curling and blowing about her forehead like tiny red-gold clouds. Honestly no young man could have remained angry with her for any great length of time.
She slipped one arm through Esther's, as Esther had continued white and nervous, and beckoning Polly with the other to join them, with the merest inclination of her head the Princess started to lead the little company away. But before she had gone more than a few feet she stopped and turned around.
The young man was standing exactly where they had left him with his hat still in his hand and his face and figure rigid.