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"And, of course, you long for an opportunity of wiping out the defeat?" said Frina. "Curiously enough, that idea has not risen uppermost in my thoughts," Petrescu answered. "I owe the Englishman an apology for the attack which was made upon him directly he succeeded in wounding me.
It was Baron Petrescu; and going to the house which was next to that in which the lamp shone, he knocked twice at the door in a peculiar manner which was evidently a known summons to those within. Some considerable time elapsed before the summons was answered, but the Baron showed no impatience, and this manifest knowledge of the ways of the establishment did not inspire Ellerey with confidence.
"I would narrow the Count's limit, and say the palace of Sturatzberg," said De Froilette, bending over the Queen's hand. "No word for the women of their own country," laughed the Queen. "Are we so unpatriotic, Baron Petrescu?" and she turned to a man who was standing close behind her. "I fear so, your Majesty.
She looked at him, or rather beyond him, and turning to discover the cause, he saw Desmond Ellerey crossing the room toward her. He also became aware that Baron Petrescu was standing close to him and that he was watching Ellerey, too. Frina Mavrodin spoke quickly to her cavalier, telling him perhaps where he would find her for the promised dance, but at any rate she dismissed him.
"Love might prove incentive enough," said Frina. Petrescu turned to her quickly. The look in her eyes told him her secret plainly enough, but her words were sufficient to have a quickening influence on the hopes which had died within him. "I may be jumping to a rash conclusion," Frina went on hastily, "but if I am right indeed, whatever art is used, what hope is there of success?"
He was less attractive to watch than the Baron, slower, it seemed, in his movements, and with less invention and resource, yet Petrescu appeared to gain no advantage. Every thrust he made was parried, if rather late sometimes, still parried, and he found that his adversary's wrist, if less flexible than his own, was of iron.
Am I the wife of some bourgeois in the city to inflame the Baron's susceptibilities into indiscretion? It is some such tale I have heard." "But which you knew to be untrue, Countess." "I have thought more highly of Baron Petrescu than that, I admit." "Naturally, seeing that Captain Ellerey is not a bourgeois of the city, and has no wife as far as I know.
They went together toward the light, and Grigosie knocked at the door as Baron Petrescu had done. There was the same delay, the self-same shaggy head was thrust out to the intruders. Silence reigned again until the stentorian voice had shouted, and then the clattering and the voices started instantly. The man led them aside into the same room.
Are you all so ready to believe evil of the woman who has served your Princess so well? I stake my honor that with her Maritza is safe." "True; but speak less harshly, Captain," whispered Petrescu. "These men are our friends; do not anger them." "He from whom I had the news ever speaks the truth," said the man who had told the story. "He has never failed us in the past."
"You had better read that, Baron," he said, handing him Maritza's letter. Petrescu took the scrap of paper and read it carefully. "I met Maritza long ago in England," he said as Petrescu looked at him. "She has remembered it, you see, and I I came to Sturatzberg." "Then the Countess is " "My friend, but Maritza -We waste precious time, Baron; I must follow Maritza." "I understand. Come and eat.
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