“And what is the last question?” she asked, smiling to cloak her uneasiness.
D’Alquen drew a deep breath, as a man will before taking a plunge or dealing a blow.
“You know—you knew Prince Roel of Rapsberg?”
His eyes were fixed on her face with a glittering eagerness. Somehow, by a strange prescience, she had felt that the question would refer to the vanished prince. So, fortunately, she was hardly taken by surprise, and could answer steadily—
“I have met Prince Roel in town and have danced with him.”
“You know he has mysteriously disappeared?”
“Mein Herr,” she returned, with a touch of bantering reproof, “you said there was only one more question to conclude your catechism.”
“You cannot answer this?” he demanded sharply and fiercely.
His manner gave her a thrill of fear, but she fought against betraying it. “Answer it, mein Herr? There is not much to answer. I have heard the report like the rest of the world.”
He gave a toss of the head. “Yes, yes. Before you left the city?”