“I wasn’t,” very indignantly. “I’m paying for my story all right. I never cheat.” She edged back quite half an inch on to the couch again.
“Well, he decided that, if he could find the mark and also read the lady’s thoughts correctly, he would know if she really was the princess. So he waited for many days looking for a really good opportunity.”
“Yes. Very many days.”
“Until finally he thought that he had hit the right time. So one evening he got very close to the lady he thought was the princess.”
“By a trick!”
“As you say, by a trick. I said he was getting clever. He managed to get quite close to her, and then he put his arm round her so that she couldn’t get away—like that.” Aryenis suffered it.
“And then he wondered whether the first thing would be to read her thoughts or to look for the fairy mark. But he decided that the important point was first to see if she had the proper mark. So he drew her closer.”
Aryenis kept her face resolutely turned away. I wonder she didn’t get a crick in her neck. Besides, it must be painful to have some one speaking right into your ear.
“Pulled her quite close, and then—I wonder what he did then.”
No answer.