So he sat still beside the chimney, well shielded by the evergreens in tubs, until the voices and the footsteps were gone. Then he took all his courage in his hands, and slid. Well for him that the ancient builders of the Palace had been reckless with lead, that the gutter was both wide and deep. Well for Nikky, too, waiting in the boudoir below and hard-driven between love and anxiety.
The Crown Prince, unaccustomed to tiles, turned over halfway down, and rolled. He brought up with a jerk in the gutter, quite safe, but extremely frightened. And the horrid memory of the Crystal Palace child filled his mind, to the exclusion of everything else. He sat there for quite a few minutes. There was no ball in sight, and the roof looked even steeper from this point.
Being completely self-engrossed, therefore, he did not see that the roof had another visitor. Had two visitors, as a matter of fact. One of them wore a blanket with a white “O” over a white “X” on it, and the other wore a mask, and considerable kitchen cutlery fastened to his belt. They had come out of a small door in the turret and were very much at ease. They leaned over the parapet and admired the view. They strutted about the flat roof, and sang, at least one of them sang a very strange refrain, which was something about
“Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest;
Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum.”
And then they climbed on one of the garden chairs and looked over the expanse of the roof, which was when they saw Prince Ferdinand William Otto, and gazed at him.
“Gee whiz!” said the larger pirate, through his mask. “What are you doing there?”
The Crown Prince started, and stared. “I am sitting here,” explained the Crown Prince, trying to look as though he usually sat in lead gutters. “I am looking for a ball.”
“You’re looking for a fall, I guess,” observed the pirate. “You don’t remember me, kid, do you?”
“I can’t see your face, but I know your voice.” His voice trembled with excitement.
“Lemme give you a hand,” said the pirate, whipping off his mask. “You make me nervous, sitting there. You’ve got a nerve, you have.”