"Would you know Prince Frederic if you were to see him?" quietly asked
Lorry.
"I have not seen him since he was a very small boy, and then but for a
moment--on the day when he and his mother were driven through the
streets on their way to exile."
"We have a new man in the Castle Guard and there is a mystery attached
to him. Would you mind looking at him and telling us if he is what
Frederic might be in his manhood?" Lorry put the question and everyone
present drew a deep breath of interest.
Mizrox readily consented and Baldos, intercepted on his rounds, was led
unsuspecting into an outer chamber. The duke, accompanied by Lorry and
Baron Dangloss, entered the room. They were gone from the assemblage but
a few minutes, returning with smiles of uncertainty on their faces.
"It is impossible, your highness, for me to say whether or not it is
Frederic," said the duke frankly. "He is what I imagine the pretender
might be at his age, but it would be sheer folly for me to speculate. I
do not know the man."
Beverly squeezed the Countess Dagmar's arm convulsively.
"Hurrah!" she whispered, in great relief. Dagmar looked at her in
astonishment. She could not fathom the whimsical American.
"They have been keeping an incessant watch over the home of Frederic's
cousin. He is to marry her when the time is propitious," volunteered the
young duke. "She is the most beautiful girl in Axphain, and the family
is one of the wealthiest. Her parents bitterly oppose the match. They
were to have been secretly married some months ago, and there is a rumor
to the effect that they did succeed in evading the vigilance of her
people."
"You mean that they may be married?" asked Yetive, casting a quick
glance at Beverly.
"It is not improbable, your highness. He is known to be a daring young
fellow, and he has never failed in a siege against the heart of
woman. Report has it that he is the most invincible Lothario that ever
donned love's armor." Beverly was conscious of furtive glances in her
direction, and a faint pink stole into her temples." Our fugitive
princes are lucky in neither love nor war," went on the duke." Poor
Dantan, who is hiding from Gabriel, is betrothed to the daughter of the
present prime minister of Dawsbergen, the beautiful Iolanda, I have seen
her. She is glorious, your highness."
"I, too, have seen her," said Yetive, more gravely than she
thought. "The report of their betrothal is true, then?"
"His sudden overthrow prevented the nuptials which were to have taken
place in a month had not Gabriel returned. Her father, the Duke of Matz,
wisely accepted the inevitable and became prime minister to
Gabriel. Iolanda, it is said, remains true to him and sends messages to
him as he wanders through the mountains."