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The lodge was some distance from the house, in a grove of trees where the drive met the county road. There were two white stone pillars to mark the entrance, but the iron gates, once closed and tended by the lodge-keeper, now stood permanently open. The day of the motor-car had come; no one had time for closed gates and lodge-keepers.

The Baron always withdrew with the other company at about midnight, and came back a quarter of an hour later. The secret of this secrecy was as follows. The lodge-keepers of the house were a Monsieur and Madame Olivier, who, under the Baron's patronage, had been promoted from their humble and not very lucrative post in the Rue du Doyenne to the highly-paid and handsome one in the Rue Vanneau.

We will make friends with the lodge-keepers, and we will call the park yours, Sophy; and I shall be a genius who weaves magical baskets, and you shall be the enchanted princess concealed from all evil eyes, knitting doileys of pearl under leaves of emerald, and catching no sound from the world of perishable life, except as the boughs whisper and the birds sing."

The only thing that worried me was the thought that there might be a lodge at the top. If so I was by no means out of the wood. Even the most guileless of lodge-keepers would be bound to think it rather curious that I should be creeping out at this time of night accompanied by his master's bicycle.

Dickson replied with affected cheerfulness. "To-morrow you and me will take the road for Auchenlochan. We needn't trouble ourselves about an ugly old house and a wheen impident lodge-keepers." "To-morrow I'm going to get inside the place. Don't come unless you like, but it's no use arguing with me. My mind is made up."

So much he could make out dimly through the November darkness; and as he stood there hesitating, he thought he could see somewhere below him a few other lights burning through the masses of leafless trees through which the drive went downhill. He knew very well by experience that lodge-keepers were, taken altogether, perhaps the most unsympathetic class in the community.

So now goodbye; hope you'll enjoy yourself. I shall have just time to get to Hambrook and back; I want to see my solicitor. You'll have seen everything in a couple of hours, so in a couple of hours I shall be waiting for you here. Part II It was as the Major said. The lodge-keepers asked no questions, and they passed up the drive, through the silence of an overgrowth of laurels and rhododendrons.

Fortescue never to go outside the park gates unaccompanied; when he went to town, or to Amsterdam, Ramon always went with him, and both were armed. I also gave strict orders to the lodge-keepers to admit no strangers without authority, and to give me immediate information as to any suspicious-looking characters whom they might see loitering about.

The Baron always withdrew with the other company at about midnight, and came back a quarter of an hour later. The secret of this secrecy was as follows. The lodge-keepers of the house were a Monsieur and Madame Olivier, who, under the Baron's patronage, had been promoted from their humble and not very lucrative post in the Rue du Doyenne to the highly-paid and handsome one in the Rue Vanneau.

The playmates of the crown prince and his brothers have been not merely the sons of nobles forming part of the imperial household and court, but likewise the children of employés of much less exalted rank, such as the sons of lodge-keepers, gardeners, game-keepers, etc., who all played and tumbled with the young princes on a footing of the most perfect equality, drubbing one another totally irrespective of rank.