"You will not go to the ball, and you will not dance with me."
"What am I to do then? Go to bed, perhaps!"
"Nor that either. In a manner of speaking, indeed, you will go to the ball, but only to pass through the great apartments, making your obeisance to Csaba as you do so; then—well, then—you will go out into the garden and wait until I come to you. Wait by a fountain in the middle of the garden—within it, in the centre, a representation of Hercules destroying the Hydra. Wait, and do exactly what I tell you."
"Shall you be alone?"
"Nay, nay," she replied, with one of her usual smiles. "Ah no, he will be with me. But of that take no notice. Do exactly what I tell you—when we meet—and when he overhears what I say."
"When he overhears!"
"'Tis so. Now, for last instructions, take these. Come not to the Hôtel d'Aragon till midnight strikes. I shall be there earlier, but come not yourself till then."
"And——?"
"Take your cue from me."
At midnight I was there, outside the great doors of the Hôtel d'Aragon, descending from my chaise-roulante and seeing a few late arrivals like myself pass in, as well as perceiving through those wide open doors a mighty great assembly within. Whereon I, too, went in, the Prince's menials bawling out my name, though, as not one of them pronounced it aright, simple though it was, they might as well not have done so at all.