“You are right,—he must. But did you intend to tell him so? I know Caerleon a good deal better than you do, and you may take my word for it that as soon as you had finished your remarks he would go straight to Miss O’Malachy and lay the crown at her feet. So far as he is concerned, you must let the matter take its course. Nothing can be said to him.”
“But how, then, would you prevent it?” cried M. Drakovics. “Is the girl to be kidnapped and carried off?”
“My good sir—no! Do you want all Europe in a ferment, and Caerleon throwing up the kingdom to go and look for her? The O’Malachy and his wife would make the finest political capital possible out of such a tale. No; we must act merely by means of moral suasion, you and I and Miss O’Malachy.”
“Miss O’Malachy? The girl?” gasped M. Drakovics.
“Exactly—the young lady. You are a very clever man, M. Drakovics, but you have not had the advantage of spending a year in the British Embassy at Pavelsburg, and making an exhaustive study of Scythian society ladies. I know well enough the Cercle Evangélique in which Miss O’Malachy was brought up—not that it is in favour in high quarters, quite the contrary; but I was interested in it out of curiosity. Its members may be called fanatics—they certainly are not worldly-wise—and I am pretty sure that Princess Soudaroff has made her god-daughter as great an enthusiast as she is herself. Now you will see why I am ready to lay aside in her case the usual rule of considering every one a knave until he or she is proved otherwise, and why I expect her to do our business for us.”
“But how?”
“I will lay the case before her, and point out that Caerleon will ruin his cause and jeopardise his crown if he marries her. Then she will refuse him for his own sake.”
“Impossible, milord! Refuse a crown?”
“For his sake, I tell you. That’s what the girl is like. Well, will you leave it to me? If I fail, after fair trial, I give you full leave to break off the match in your own way.”
“I agree, milord, though I cannot believe you will succeed. No woman on earth would decline a crown, to be shared with the man whom, according to you, she loves passionately. But you shall try. By all means, milord, we work together, if you please.”