 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thoroughly Ruxton by Philip Viral-Migales. Chapter 9. Revelations in a runaway. More furiously than ever before had James trailed that afternoon. Never had a day been finer, the assemblage of carriages and riders in the park more brilliant, or thoroughly more alive with the ever-vescence of youth and the fire of joy. Her horse, a superb Arabian, glossy as the sun itself and darkly red as the richest autumn foliage, was ignited by her spirit. He pranced, cavorted, arched his neck in pride of the dainty mistress on his back, and ached for a chance to let out his powers for once and prove himself worthy of her love. Already she loved him in a riotous mood that extended to the ruddy world in its regal splendours of colour. Not since a day in the faraway spring had she been thus enthroned in a saddle. Her spirit vaulted tempestuously ahead of the galloping steed. He gloried in the rush and motion the exhilarating air with its touch of frost hurled upon her by her, cleaving through the newfound avenues of pleasure. She rode like a splendid young valkyrie, wielded by skill and sheer abandon into wondrous unity with the animal excited and delighted by her weight. It was only wild riding in the sense of its utter freedom, beauty and spontaneity. It was rhythm and spirit and courage exemplified in her absolute confidence and passion for living and motion. She dashed through one of the bridal paths that parallel a drive like a vision of velocity and beauty. From a hundred glinting carriages flinging back the sun rays from varnish, silver and burnished animals, a wondering procession of wealth's spoiled darlings paid her the tribute of their stares, their gasps, curiosity and admiration. Some for the marvel of her coloring and grace, the proud, handsome face exquisitely regal, some for such horsemanship as the park had rarely seen, and some for her daring and apparent recklessness. The men and women drifting by on the tide of luxury and ease were magnetized, despite themselves while thoroughly was completely unaware. She raced from their sight like a fragment from an epic of rapture. Her joy and her Amazonian liberty and flight was a thing to be felt by all who saw, so potent were its radiant emanations. Round the bed with James in desperation spurring at the rear, she encountered a party of equestrians, men and women, posting along like a dozen conventional automatons, invented for mechanical riding. With one accord they turned to watch her pass. Beyond them she approached and overtook three women riding in a group. The farther she rode the sweeter grew the breath that swept from the autumn perfume trees, and the wilder became the answer to of her spirit. It seemed like a ride through amber, gold and flame. Every vista looming ahead in her path seemed a red-lit glow of welcome. Then the way once more drew in a breast, a drive, where again the pageantry of wealth rolled languorously by. Broms, coupes, glinting automobiles, handsoms, barouches, and children's fathons, decorously winding the highways of indulgence, and flinging off their largesse of light, from a thousand flashing spokes moved into opposing streams. Again as before the homage of their seldom stirred attention was paid to thoroughly, romping past, a hundred scions of the house of ease inquired who she was. Then from one of the carriages occupied solely by one old woman, and a broad athletic young man came a note of surprise and gladness, which started as if to become a shout and ended much suppressed. The eager young man half rose in his seat, showing his arm in a sling. It was robbly stiverant, once more desperately hoping for the vision of a face which at last he had seen once again. He saw her skimming lightly by, with never a turn of her head, her thoroughbred tingle with his glad response to the beating and wish of her heart. He wanted to cry out mightily to turn and pursue, to halt her somewhere, anywhere, for a moment of looking in her eyes. She was gone almost before his thoughts could arrange themselves in order. Stifling and utterance akin to a groan he sank once more on the cushions and instantly recovered sufficient of his natural acumen to gaze out again for thoroughly's attendant. Great roaring ghosts, he exclaimed aloud as James went feverishly past, he had recognized Alice's man. A mad, unreasoning impulse to escape his present obligations with the quiet old woman at his side and hastened pel-mel to the van Kirk mansion was the initial suggestion in his brain that he knew that no one would be found at home and could only hope that thoroughly might cross his orbit again. It seemed likely that she would cross every orbit in the world, while for herself it was merely the whine of unbridled delight that increased in her nature as she rode. With the horse it was madness that was growing. He too was aflame with the love of speed, the tang of nude nature in the air, the urging of joy-heated blood. She slowed him at the crossing of a pedestrian's path, and he quivered with impatience to be off again, to the light alike the kindred spirit on his back and the riot in his veins. She lifted the reins and he was swiftly galloping, dipping to earth like a swallow. They were headed south, the park's length northward as far as the riding pathway went, and the width of it westward had been rapidly traversed. They would be obliged to make its round a half-dozen times to satisfy Thurley's craving for the joy. The graveled ways, one close to the side of the western drive, were only a few of the chariots of wealth and fashion paraded. A number of rapidly moving automobiles were here almost entirely in possession of the road. It was near the spot where Robby Stiverand had fallen in the rain, and Thurley had been launched by kindly fates. A racing car came swiftly down the stretch, its reckless driver willfully and wantonly shattering the most liberal of the speed regulations. A breast of Thurley's Arabian already strung to the highest nervous tension. The fellow suddenly opened his muffler cut-out and his great motor roared with deafening percussions. Instantly bolting after one wild leap aside, the animal under Thurley flattened oddly down above the earth, already streaming greatly away beneath him, and ran with all his might. His speed was terrific, not in the motion, which had steadied to a strangely easy undulation, but because of the bite of impinging air, the dizzying chaos of trees, and park features stampeding by in confusion, and the scene of lost mastery lodged in the girl's delighted being but a moment earlier. She knew she was helpless to control the passion of the thoroughbred, whose bone and sinew and fiery blood had burned for this moment of delirium. She was not alarmed. The sensation engendered by the madness of speed aroused a new sort of pleasure, a welcoming to recklessness, almost a wish for still more velocity forward. She knew she could not ride like this for long without gravest dangers. There were dangers alike to herself and to everything near her. She gathered the reins more closely in and applied all the strength of her fine young arms to break his mad flight with the bit. The bar of steel was clamped in his teeth, where resistance only whetted him the more. A shout went up from someone in the road. It swept like a roar, like a wail. A head was a turn of the bridal path and beyond it she knew not what. More yells and shouts came weirdly through the air that was storming, roaring by. The horse responded, if possible, with added speed. Rocks, a bridge, a group of people walking, who barely reeled back from the animals' course in time to escape his flying hooves, made a series of blurs in the panoramic rush that the path's two sides had become. Pale with the chill of biting air and likewise with her cool comprehension of the menace of every movement, thoroughly felt the inward lean as the flight crazed Arabian with the curve and plunged on in something akin to panic, rapidly succeeding all things else that might have been present in his nature before. Then her heart turned over like a helpless bell swung too far out of its balance. The road was almost wholly occupied by ten or more riders, women and men, walking their mounts in the same direction she was racing. She could not cry out a warning. In a blinding conviction of disaster, she could only tug with sturdier might at the reins already tight as fiddle strings and hoped to stare for a foot-wide space between the nearest riders. But some one screamed, some woman sitting on an iron bench that overlooked the scene. In utter fright, the riders scattered right and left to let the comet through. Then two of the men, well-mounted and cool, spurred hotly in pursuit. They were joined a hundred yards below by a mounted policeman who swung forth already at speed before thoroughly had won to his post. He and the men from the pleasure group fell behind with the trees and rocks and wind as the thoroughbred warmed to his work. By then the cries from a score of throats had alarmed the park for a mile. The fright and excitement increased the pace as four mad riders hurtle on thoroughly white and rigid in the lead. James had been hopelessly out-distance in the first few hundred yards. Hoofbeat and screams that pierced the air sounded mad warnings down the course. The bridal path dived beneath a bridge that spanned the western drive of fashion. A hundred frightened women saw the runaway dynamic of power flashing his muscles like engine parts in the sunlight streaming rays with the stiff upright figure of the white-faced girl unflinchingly applying strength and nerve and courage to the task of subduing his madness. A second and third of the mounted police whipped into the vortex at the curve that swung on the pathway's eastward trend over across to the dangerous junction of riders' path and driveway shot the eager horse and tent upon besting the animals in pursuit. But past the policeman and past his companion crept one of the men from the group in the rear slowly but steadily gaining on the hard breathing bay that thoroughly guided. And she in the meantime finally provoked into new resolve to snatch back the mastery taughtly held before lost patience with the sensual's horse and with it all comprehension of her danger. Boy, she said, behave yourself. You ought to be ashamed. Abruptly losing both the reins she gave a sudden powerful jerk at the right one wrapped about her hand instantly sawing no less stoutly at the other. She felt the bit give back into its place against the tender portion of the creature's jaw which was then subjected to the splendid strength that the moment lent to her arms and body. She was sawing him back to another thought than that of wild stampede with ampatience that bled him at the mouth as they dashed less swiftly toward the junction. More cries ahead were mingled with the distance shouting at the rear. The driveway of fashion began to clog with vehicles halted in confusion and a fright. Then up from the rear shot the rider who had headed all but Thurley's thoroughbred. He too rode superbly and was mounted on a powerful black a bluegrass product of the racing blood without a pier in the city. Nevertheless, when the rider's hand projected forward at the last and clutched Thurley's horse by the bit she had already calmed his raging fire and had pulled him down to sideways locomotion. The group swung sharply inward to the left and Thurley's bay resentful of the needless interference flung outward again to the right. The saddle loosened by the strain and pressure of the race turned from the change of Thurley's momentum and threw her easily off on her side in the gravel. She was neither bruised nor scratched but groans and cries arose from the breathless audience in the halted procession on the drive. Policemen and the others distanced in the mad pursuit rode hotly to the scene even as Thurley sprang to her feet and took her horse in hand. The only man who had ridden with sufficient speed to be in at the crucial moment had dismounted. He was young, smooth-shaven and ruddy. He had snatched off his cap and was soberly regarding the wondrous surge of color returning to Thurley's cheeks when another man came running there from the drive's congested traffic. It was stiver and white and excited. Princess, he cried, Thurley turned, beheld him and flushed to the tips of her ears. Here, give me that horse, said one of the mounted policemen, now on foot beside the others. The young lady might have been killed. Oh, nonsense, said Thurley. He's calm enough now. If someone will please adjust the saddle. Are you hurt? said Stiver and crowding to her side. Is there anything I can do? James, other riders and a dozen men together with added numbers of policemen arrived there in all manner of haste. Thurley foresaw an interference and annoyance. She turned to Stiver and gladly as to one she felt she knew. I'm not even scratched, she told him in her spirited manner. He was stopping. He's not excited now. If the saddle hadn't turned there would be no need for anyone to help. The rider who had caught at her horse's bit had cast reddened more deeply beneath the suntan of his face. I'm sorry if you think I interfered. It was the cause. You were very kind, said Thurley, radiantly, her smile restoring his exaltation in the moment. Perhaps if you'll help me now too. Oh, here is James. The saddle, James, will you please put it on a little tighter? Look here, Miss, said the policeman who was holding his own fine animal as well as the quivering bay. I don't want to make you no trouble nor nothing like that, but this horse here is excited. He ain't fit for no lady to ride. He too received a smile. You wouldn't arrest him for a little run like that. If you please, I think I know him best. I give you my word, he'll behave. Stiver and long for the use of his injured arm. He thought of another expedient. You wouldn't think of riding him again not this morning, he said, hopelessly convinced that the girl of Thurley's spirit would think of nothing else. Let me offer to take you home. The carriage is here. James was adjusting the saddle stolidly. The rider who had all but affected a rescue fancied, he read, the one desire in Thurley's courageous nature. The horse was under control entirely, he said. I'm sorry I interfered. He was not. He was riotously glad. I'm sure the lady may be trusted to ride him safely home. Well now I don't know, said the officer. No, no, said the man in the gathering crowd. It's madness, a beast like that. Thurley had heard only the man who had ridden to her side and helped to dislodge her from her seat. She turned to him appealingly. Not home. I'd rather not go home just yet. I do wish people wouldn't act so seriously. Please help me go on as I was. Stiverin was desperate. The policeman was afraid of troubles that might still develop. You see, miss, he started above the murmur and protest of the crowd. A horse like this. Here, officer, muttered the ruddy young rider of the black, slipping a bill into the big, hard hand of the law's representative. Just scatter the crowd. With a dozen of you chavs watching him now, the horse can do no harm. He saw that James had concluded the readjustment of the saddle. May I assist you up, he added to Thurley offering his card. It's the least I can do after helping to bring you down. Thurley smiled her acceptance of the officer and received the card. Already the policeman were moving back the crowd and heading other horsemen from the scene. A number of those who were nearest the path saw Thurley once more mounted on her throne. Stiverin pressed in once again and halted in front of the restless horse looking up beseechingly. May I not see you soon, he said. If I hadn't been crippled like this, Thurley looked down at his upturned face with glory and mischief burning together in her eyes. If you can find me, yes. She did not know that he had recognized her man. Then James released the thoroughbred and she galloped quietly away. End of chapter 9 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thurley Ruckston by Philip Viral Miguelz. Chapter 10 A Royal Role A fragrant spicy furor swept searchingly through swelldom, stirring its units to the depths, when spying the intelligence no one knew, for a score of prominent personages claimed almost simultaneously to have made the discovery that Princess Thurvinia, missing from Europe and said to be traveling or visiting incognito in America, was the guest of Alice Van Kirk. The tropic storm involving curiosity envy, incredulity and the most intense concern raged with its own sort of languorous violence throughout the length and breadth of the upper social stratum. On orchid's breath and on jeweled wings the word was spread of the beauty and daring of the glorious girl who had come to masquerade among them. A hundred or more of the world's elite who knew and spoke with authority had seen the headstrong horsemanship the runaway the fall and Thurley's return to her horse's back of which all the avenue was talking. A dozen remembered to have caught a recent glimpse of Alice Van Kirk with a girl extraordinarily handsome. One or two men had heard Robby's striverant call her Princess as he ran to her assistance. The wonderful contrast of her golden hair, her chocolate eyes and the darkness of her brows had escaped no one who had seen her. Excitement, speculation and a thousand forgotten intentions to cultivate Alice Van Kirk sprang into immediate activity and the fondest of Alice's social hopes had been granted well-nigh instantaneous fulfillment. Thurley had been home an hour in Alice barely twenty minutes when the first delighted buzz of the oncoming storm penetrated the quiet magnificence of the palace on the avenue and warned the expectant hostess. It entered by means of the phone a woman's voice solicitous and dearing protesting a never-forgotten friendship and inquiring as to any possible injuries inflicted on Mrs. Van Kirk's beautiful guest by her accident in the park. It is like your enterprise my dear to harbour an errant princess added the woman caressingly. It justifies the faith I've always reposed in your originality and leadership. It is Princess Thurvinia of course. Has anyone heard me say so answered Alice evasively or anything at all? My dear, said the friend I've always praised your discretion and now you compel me again. I thought perhaps you and your charming protégé might join my little informal dinner party at the plaza on the eighth and helped to fill my horse-show-box in the evening. May I count upon you, dear? I fear it would be hardly safe, said Alice as she presently added. Goodbye! She hasten at once to Thurley's presence for need of a clarifying conference. She appeared quite calm even languid as she came in tall erect and almost military in her strong resemblance to the major statement was burning in her bosom. Accounts of Thurley's ride had been sufficiently agitating but this was a vastly different order. Dear child, she said employing an appellation recently born of her swiftly increasing fondness for the girl I wonder if you realize all that happened today in the park. Thurley, who was resting after a session with her maids, looked up at Alice inquiringly a serious pucker on her brow. They had spoken of the accident before. Why, not if it's anything dreadful. Nothing I hope to give you worry, she said. You haven't decided after all that I'm not to ride him again. It isn't that. But as for worry, judge for yourself, said Alice with a smile. You convinced the world, our world at least, that Princess Thurvinia, living for some time incognito was here in New York as my guest. Thurley was grave and flushed for a moment then, burst into laughter, deliciously fresh, utterly ridiculous, it's perfectly absurd. I wonder why Mr. Stiverin should call me. But of course they will soon understand no one could long be deceived by anything so ludicrous. That is not altogether so certain. Alice answered seriously. What was it Robby Stiverin called you, my dear? Why, Princess, I think, her cheeks took on a tint of embarrassment and pleasure. Of course, he doesn't know my name, but why should he think if he is the only one who thinks so, so peculiarly he is not, dear child. He is one of scores who are quite convinced they have shown tremendous acumen in making the same discovery. Doesn't the notion rather amuse and please you? Why, but no, think of daring to let them, of posing, I mean, and being revealed and all that. It might be amusing for a day, of course, especially with all you are doing, giving me, making of me here, but Alice, to dare to claim, don't you see how you, I mean, how I, both of us would appear the minute the facts came out. Alice, now that precisely, my dear, thoroughly, and that is exactly why we do not intend to make the slightest claim or pretence to anything of the sort. But do you think of any good reason for revealing anything at all? Should we try to disabuse the minds of any of those people who flattered themselves by their cleverness in discovering the marked resemblance between you and Princess Thervinia? Thoroughly looked at her sharply, her eyes grown grave at once. Do you mean, I mean, my dear, that if we denied the soft impeachment, we should only convince them the more. I mean, it would certainly amuse us both and afford us immeasurable entertainment to permit them to think what they please, to assert nothing, deny nothing, merely permit events to shape themselves as they will. Wouldn't that please and amuse you, dear? Couldn't you play the role, the role of a princess, the role of a lovely young girl whose identity is wholly unknown. If you fit the mould of a princess, I should call it singularly good fortune. Thoroughly burned warmly again with innate modesty and with irrepressible delight in the thought with its attendant possibilities. But I shouldn't know the very first thing of the way a princess behaves or talks or anything, and Princess Thervinia must be German or something like it, of course, and you once taught French and German and told me you lived three years on the continent. I have heard you speaking both languages to your maids. In addition to that, you must certainly see that Princess Thervinia attempting to conceal herself or to masquerade in Manhattan would naturally make every possible effort to act as unlike a royal personage as possible. Oh, you could do it, my dear, if that was our desire. But at most I have only suggested the amusement of maintaining absolute secrecy or mystery as to who and what you are and permitting our clever acquaintances to do the rest for themselves. You will do this much to please me, I am sure, thoroughly regarded her soberly. You desire it very much? It would please me greatly, amuse me, afford me new interest in life. Thoroughly was silent for a moment her face flushed and paler by turns, slowly the brightest sparkle of a smile and flash of jewel brightness came to her eyes. It would be a lark. Good fun. You'll do it, dear. Alice was far more eager than accent her movement, could possibly indicate. Thoroughly was instantly reflective. What would the role involve? I mean, how should I have to begin? You see, I don't in the least know what I should have to do. Do almost nothing, Alice informed her eagerly. Let people make fools of themselves, if that's their whim. It's so much more complete. We shall simply evade and parry all questions, make no claims, and rather avoid the subject than court it. All I require of you, my dear, is that you make no disclaimers to anyone, that you reveal nothing at all from the past, and that you spend money regally, that continue lovely, and avoid all heart entanglements for at least a year. You know I asked that before and received your acceptance of the condition. You are free, of course, to conduct all the mild flirtations, you please. I really wish you to be royally happy and free. Oh, Lordy, said thoroughly, girlishly, her face fairly beaming with dimpling smiles. It's so comical. Do you really think I'm worth it? Think I shan't make a failure of it all? She had risen in her new excitement of spirit, and Alice rose to take her two warm hands. Dear child, she said, I don't believe there's an ounce of failure in your composition. If you wish to know, I think it rather your natural right to be an American princess. She kissed her honestly, adding, I have always felt I'd like to make one my own way. Thoroughly smiled with tender wistfulness. I'm so afraid I may have to wake up. I was never loyal to a fairy queen before. It's so odd to have to believe in fairies now. But you do. It's a bargain, then. My harsh conditions and all. Why, I suppose so. It could do no harm to anyone in the world. But suppose that someone, anyone I used to know, should find me out and explode the little fiction. What fiction, said Alice? You see, my dear, we are putting forth no fiction. We must both remember that. Besides, you are rather far removed from your older life and associations. Let's consider the agreement settled and begin to enjoy the play. I couldn't help enjoying the situation, thoroughly admitted. I'm afraid I'm hopelessly human. Thank Heaven, said Alice. Let's go down. I hear the phone. End of chapter 10. This is a Librebox recording. All Librebox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librebox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thoroughly Ruxton by Philip Viral Miguelz. Chapter 11. Confirming a Rumor. All evening the telephone was jangling and the wire was warm with invitations, declarations of friendship, and solicitude for the nerves of the royal little rider who had been all but thrown in the park. Throughout all seldom the silvery alarms were tinkling, some as bald warnings to beware of sham, some in sheer trepidation of spirit, and some as mere relief to beings hopelessly burdened with ennui. On the following day, which was Alice's afternoon at home, the stir and the test began. Fifty or more of Gotham's elect, including delegates from the sharpest, the wealthiest, and the most inquisitive cliques remembered that attentions had long been due to Alice van Kirk, and arrived to meet their obligations. Stiverent came at four only to find himself helplessly isolated from the princes by others more prompt than himself. He had never thought her so regally dainty, so altogether irresistible and exquisite, as he found her today when she gave him her hand, the moment when Alice formally made them acquainted. She was introduced merely as Miss Thurley, and not by the slightest sign or hint was the claim to royalty admitted. No vision more girlishly lovely, sincere, or disarming than she presented, thereby Alice's side had ever been known in all Manhattan. To those of the keenly astute frame of mind who addressed her in French or German, she replied in their chosen tongue with frequency and ease that almost invariably shamed their somewhat puny and unpracticed accomplishments in continental languages. The very evasions and faint denials by which Alice parried the bolder assertions that Thurley had been instantly recognized and might as well be confessed only served to strengthen the conviction as to Thurley's royal origin. It was all adroit, tactful, insidious, and it met its just reward. Those who had come surcharged with doubt and ready to prick the bubble of Alice van Kirk's latest triumph were the first to be self-deluded, and hence the wonder grew. Amiga five minutes was the utmost that Stivert and Thurley could manage to detach, in which to be even approximately alone. He was simply nearer to her side than anyone else as she sat in the corner of the room. He moved a trifle closer and lowered his voice. Did you think I should find you yesterday, Miss Thurley, when you gave me permission to try? She met the ardour of his gaze with candid interest, noting the change that absence of pain had wrought upon his face and mentally approving his finely chiseled features, the healthy glow of his colour, and the steady level of his warm grey eyes. She laughed. Did I appear to stop and think at all? You haven't spoken of your wrist. I hope it's mending rapidly. His eyes were shining. I still prefer someone else to drive the car. Will you sometime permit me to thank you properly? Would it be so improper now? He met her merry glance undaunted. It would be a sacrilege in the presence of all these persons. Of course you're aware they are simply a lot of self-appointed appraisers, and I'm sure you know I am not. I must be very knowing, said Thurley, to know so much so soon. It's the third time we've met, he answered. There is always a charm in threes. Her eyes showed mocked ejection. Oh, isn't that too bad? You may wish never to disturb the charm again. He was equal to the quip. It can never be disturbed once established like this. In fact, as soon as you took the wheel that day in the park, it was complete. I feared it, she answered, complete, finished, labelled, and laid away to be forgotten. He was non-plus, only for a moment. I can see you were never a boy when the jam was labelled and laid away to be remembered. He glanced up quickly, where one of the maids had admitted new collars at the door. Good heavens, he added, beholding, two exceedingly ample women, surging in majestically. Moral dreadnots, I wanted to ask, but Alice was coming. Thurley rose not only to meet the imposing visitors, but also a man in their company. For a moment she wondered almost in fear where the eyes of this man might have confronted hers before. Then she knew him. The rider encountered in the park. He who had raced to halt her horse and helped her sudden dismounting. His name was Kelsey Woods. Eh, shamelessly glad to see you again, he informed her with pleasant boldness of candour. Sorry not to find you riding out today. Then his eyes came to rest for a second on the face of robbly stiverant, heading for Alice van Kirk. Their glances met and exchanged some manner of challenge that their formal bows made little attempt to disguise. Three minutes later, when Lady Honour Calthrupp and young Count José Vicencio E. Faiishi, the fiery Spanish-Italian dualist, and Romeo of numerous European capitalists made their appearance, Alice's cup was filled with the violence almost alarming. Ah, Mamzer said the Count almost instantly on his presentation to Thurley, his voice reminiscent of the Suvian flames and lovers. In St. Petersburg I die three times to have this honour. Mine at last. And he kissed her hand with Italian fervor and Spanish grace, cracking his heels together energetically as he bent his supple waist. At last my soul is in flight above the clouds. But you do not recall you have seen me, no? I'm afraid I do not, said Thurley, unprepared for such demonstration. I'm sure I should remember. Val Gemidius, he answered, from his altitude above the clouds, you have only changed to become more lovely. Then he met the cold American stare of Stiverant's blue-grey and Woods's light greenish eyes and a little comprehended that the course, the Romeo's order may not be so smooth as milk. Thurley escaped with a surge of release to the placid stolidity of Lady Honour Calthrop's presence and began to wonder how the game on which she had entered would end. It had only begun. The afternoon was a calm, unexcited prologue merely of the complications, rivalries, shocks and surprises already mustard out beyond, to procession into and through her life, newly launched in its royal career. Conventionality cleared the house within the ensuing hour, but nothing could clear the pathway reaching out ahead where its windings and grades, its rocky slopes and grassy reaches were alike obscured in the veils of things that were yet to be too remote to cast a shadow or reflect the glow of the sun. In the next few days, full confirmation of the fact that Alice Van Kirk's protégé was none other than the royal princess Thurvinia was vouchsafe from every direction despite the Van Kirk evasions and Thurley's avoidance of the subject. Becedures stormed the Fifth Avenue mansion in droves, friends, admirers, invitations multiplied appallingly, and then the horse show opened the season of the goddesses of wealth. End of chapter 11. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thurley-Ruckston by Philip Viral-Migels. Chapter 12. Horses and Humans. Never had a premiere of society's pet function been so brilliant. Never had the gilded hostelries of Gotham entertained so great a number of guests at horse show dinners, nor had special decorations and favors at the gorgeous dining rooms ever been so lavish or so costly. It was the night of the horse and splendor, the splendor of raiment, jewels, and beauty for which American women are famous throughout the world. The attendance at huge, old, transformed Madison Square Garden was more brilliant than either the show or the setting. It was late when the boxes began to fill. The arena boxes separated from the horse's ring only by the railed-off promenade. Superbly gowned and furred, the women began to arrive at nine, despite the fact that many ring events had been scheduled for an hour earlier. At half-past nine, with six magnificent teams of heavy draft horses proudly entering upon the tanbark and the boxes practically filled, the band by mere coincidence struck up the German national anthem, and thoroughly, and Alice arrived. A murmur of excitement, admiration, and homage almost instantly arose. No more exquisitely regal figure had ever graced the garden than thoroughly presented, moving slowly with Alice and her party to their box. Never had thoroughly's fresh, young beauty so glowed and irradiated charm. She was gowned like a veritable princess at this very court. With herself and Alice were Lady Honour Calfrup, Major Rutherford of the Seventh British Assars, the honourable Miss Dorothy Hedrington, Lieutenant Leigh Gerard Curtis, 14th Cavalry, USA, and his wife, all of whom had comprised the Van Cork dinner party at the plaza. Thoroughly had never been more happily excited in her life than when, as they reached their box and assumed their seats, the beauty and thrill of it crept to her senses and the wine of it surged in her pulses. She was unaware of a thousand pair of eyes already focused upon her. Her heart was beating to the music. Her colour was glowing to the soft and refulgence of the thousand crystals of flame. Her nature was tingling with warmth and delight as the sight of the 24 great horses in the ring, six teams of four each, superbly accoutred and arching their necks with conscious pride in their strength and breeding as they moved about on the tanbark of the oval. Below her were scores of beings of all degrees in the social world, a fringe of men and women absorbingly interested in horses and horses, hung upon the wooden rail about the ring as children might at a circus. Behind them and frequently mingling with them were men in evening costume and women richly gowned who represented the sporting element of Gotham's elect. Between these, a latter and the balustrade of the boxes paraded scores and droves of the curious, frankly inspecting the occupants of favourite seats above them. All sorts and conditions were represented in this evermoving procession from the wealthiest and most select to the poorest girl worker from some Broadway office, treating herself to this proximity to wealth and the science thereof. Far across and up and down the huge arena the scores of boxes were filled with darlings of money and power, and back and forth their occupants were visiting, a hundred already alive with interest at the news that the princess had appeared. Robby Stiverand arrived at the van Kirkbox almost at Alice's heels. He had barely time to pay his respects to the occupants and be formally presented to Major Rutherford and the Vesuvian Romeo Count Faiishi likewise arrived to be followed by Young Baron Clemche, Captain Fowler, Beau Bremer of the Diplomatic Service and constant stream of eager visitors. No less than half a dozen boxes were emptied forthwith as their holders joined the now congesting parades slowly moving by the place where thoroughly sat. Amused and too diverted by the horses and pageantry of notables, defined conversation with Stiverand or any other possible, the princess gained in animation momentarily and her smile became more infectious and winning. Ah, Highness! she heard Count Faiishi murmur in his reckless ardor. I am a dropping from the clouds these you once again. My wings are your smiles. You will not to see me dash to earth with all his rocks one smile. I soar again. Ah! Thoroughly had smiled it may not be denied. You are very considerate, she told him. You fear the rocks might be broken? Virgin Santissimo, no, he assured her. My heart! she smiled again and yet he did not soar but instead edge closer with his chair. It is a divinity, he murmured. It is above paradise and he did not finish his description. Stiverand was glowering upon him forbiddingly. How utterly he loathed the being who could bring his grimaces and deportment of courtship to this public theater but the interruption came from another source. Kelsey Woods, the dashing horseman of the park, had crowded forward in the press below thoroughly seat and saluting with his hat, held up his hand for the formal grip that hundreds were exchanging between boxes and parade. It began to fear you might not come, he confessed with his usual canter. Been watching constantly. I say I thought I might ask you to ride my hunter Wednesday night and perhaps drive my Hackney's as well. What do you say? Thoroughly appeared all innocence, all at once, Mr. Woods. Wouldn't it seem an innovation? Did I make it sound like that? He begged. A reversion to my English schooling, shocking habit, but you'll ride the hunter. He's a beauty. Alice leaned down above the throne. Kelsey Woods, she said, please take your temptations to another quarter. A sudden ripple of applause as a team of magnificent Norman Percherons received the blue ribbon for a first award startled thoroughly to attention on the horses. They were trotting off like big good-natured playfellows of toil and the girls softly glowing eyes abruptly focused on a new face at which she gazed in unexplainable fascination. The face was that of a woman, a well-broomed aristocratic looking woman with an air of something distinctly foreign in her composition. She was pale. Her face was of an olive tint and it was large, too large for beauty or anything save a certain sense of strength. It was her eyes, however, that exercised the fascination. They were slightly slanted, exceptionally wide apart and of the palest ice blue color imaginable. Fixed upon Thurley's face with singular intensity, these eyes became for a moment the only visible objects presented to the girl in all the theater of color and motion. They were baleful, poisonous-seeming eyes penetrative and disturbingly insistent in their stare. All their concentrated power appeared to be centered on the girl who felt herself swiftly losing her sense of joy and partaking of coldness of the nerves. By an effort, Thurley wrenched her own honest gaze from the woman's and smiled up at Stiverin standing at Alice's side. In the grateful light he gave her from his warm gray eyes she felt new security, a comradeship that some way took her instantly back to that day in the park when a fall broke his wrist and placed him for a little in her care. End of chapter 12. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thurley Ruckston by Philip Viral Miguelz. Chapter 13. Elements of complication. When she glanced again toward the crowds in the ring the woman of icy eyes had disappeared. By then the nature of the show had undergone a change. The interval between events in the ring was seized upon with astonishing avidity by scores and droves of box inhabitants eager to avail themselves of near inspection of or an introduction to the royal little person who had come to their show beneath the wing of Alice van Kirk. The fortification was besieged. Dozens of the younger men nearly as many of their elders and women in bevvies crowded to the place. Numbers to halt in the promenade but the vast majority to juggle for presentation to the princess. It ceased to be a horse show and became a royal levy. Confused and excited but growing momentarily more gracious and girlish even as she grew more beautiful with the flush of color in her cheeks. Thurley could barely murmur a conventional formula to each one thus presented and think with terror on the utter impossibility of ever remembering all those names and faces. Alice van Kirk meantime was hardly less occupied than Thurley to manage her own situation with the diplomatic adroitness demanded by the moment. She was smothered with honors invitations and a popularity absolutely overwhelming. A score of attentions and recognition she coveted were indiscriminately mingled with twice as many more she wished to scorn. The younger men whom first of all she wished to magnetize aware that success in her social ambitions would follow where they led had multiplied to alarming numbers in a flash. Her triumph was a species of landslide of inconvenient propositions she did not know and could not have known at the moment that with all these men it was Thurley's exquisite beauty her irresistible personality and radiant charm more than all her advertised royalty of origin that wrought the magnetic spell. She only saw her protégé growing instantly more and more an object of something akin to social worship and more and more secure in her hold upon the novelty loving ennui haunted beings of their world. The next event in the arena was the judging of five pairs geldings and mares shown to pheatons women to drive the band was playing selections from the latest musical comedy as the proud matched animals and their skillful drivers swung briskly in upon the tanbark ring. Thurley was instantly all attention as before from sheer love of the horses and their management. Dimly aware that Count Faishi, Robby Stivert, not to mention the Baron, the Captain, and the bow were waging a silent sort of war for the place at her side she turned from them all to the bright arena leaning girlishly forward in her fervour. A man of middle age with a mustache obviously grown in resemblance to that of Kaiser William took one King's scrutinizing inventory of the girls unusual features not at once as if to himself and disappeared in the throng. He was the second curious individual who had waited for a clear unobstructed view of her face for reasons that were not merely curiosity or admiration. There was still a third such being in the garden another woman one of the humblest of the humble a worker out of employment consumed with love of things in the unattainable highest social stratum and now far out in the tide of the crush that slowly paraded by the box where Thurley was sitting in her splendor. She was Thurley's cousin. She had seen the princess from across the ring and unable to credit her senses or believe it was she was slowly working forward with the press the fearfulest Thurley might at any moment rise and depart before she could come sufficiently close perhaps to attract her gaze. Meantime the person with the Kaiser adornment on his upper lip having cleared the close plaque audience before the royal box made rapid progress down the garden to the rear where horses and waiting with carriages, grooms and footmen were screened from the general view and saluting a tall whiskered foreigner stepped nimbly aside to report. It is she he stated murmuring his statement in German. I should know her in a million though I saw her but once at court. She saw you. She might have known you and demanded the other with evident impatience. What of that? The smaller man shook a violent negative. She neither saw me nor would she know me by any possibility though she looked for an hour in my face. The other turned and struck with his fist his palm. The folly is a headstrong folly of her escapade and to show herself in public like this here. We are helpless to move. We can only at most report. He started in a feverish stride past the carriages and servants and so emerging from behind the screen at its opposite end continued down on the farther side of the oval making his way to the exit of the garden. Once he paused with his agent at his heels to glance half resentfully across the ring at the girl on the opposite side. So beautiful. So conspicuous he muttered in throaty German. Zepero's a perpetual disaster of beauty. He shrugged his shoulders continued on and out the door and was driven away still accompanied by his man in a limousine car that was waiting for him. Thoroughly's relative during this brief period had wormed her way to a gap in the fringe of people leaning on the rail about the ring and there she caught at an anchorage from which to make her observations. She was small and insignificant this poor bit of drift in the daily tides of Gotham a woman of perhaps thirty three rather white of face slender and nervous. She bore not the slightest resemblance to Thoroughly at whom she was gazing now with faculties utterly bewildered. In one moment certain in the next unconvinced that a being so glorious so radiant so obviously one of New York's elite could possibly have any identity with Thoroughly Rockston. She lost all sense of judgment. There were moments when Alice's protégé seemed unmistakably the cousin from New Haven. In the next she appeared absolutely another individual not even so remarkably like Thoroughly after all. It seemed more over preposterous that Thoroughly could have come to this estate. Nothing in reason could account for her elevation thus to such patent favoritism with swelldoms exacting and reluctant monarchs. And then presently to the dull perception of the eager woman's ears came the tag end of a conversation every part of which she might have overheard a man was speaking one hallmarked with patrician manners. Yes he agreed as if upon mature reflection an estimate eyeing thoroughly through half-closed lids as a connoisseur a squint at a painting. She quite fulfills the final requirements in a princess. The first I ever saw that did for the most part there a bally homely lot. Princess Thervinia I confess my ignorance of her state but that hair that Flemish hair I should know that in the dark. Thoroughly's cousin gazed at the princess with newer interest all question instantly banished from her mind. She could see it was not Thoroughly now and felt herself flattered in that seat of her former doubt that had argued to utter absurdity of such social eminence for the girl who had not so long before taught students in the classic shades of Yale. But she did not move. She was singularly fascinated by this juxtaposition with royalty. It was almost marvelous just to be granted this fateful opportunity of feasting her eyes and soul for once on the beauty and graciousness of one so nobly born and reigning in the court of elegance and wealth presented here where all the worthwhile world was paying homage. Attentions to Thoroughly in the box indeed had rendered even casual regard of the horses out of the question. In vain the fair drivers whipped their pairs to speed and high stepping action. It was Thoroughly's hour despite herself and Alice was fairly dazed by the unanimity with which the eager social set was plunging into self-delusion. Events in the ring succeeded one another in a mere routine made lifeless and colorless by the greater magnetism at the box. Thoroughly had scarcely had time for more than mere quick glances at the horses of the show and Alice was thinking of the wisdom of retreat. Fifteen saddle horses for women brought to the oval and Thoroughly wished with all her heart she might enjoy them exclusively and be herself forgotten for a little time in which to catch at her wits. She turned in her chair looking out on the ring and then at the faces closer by. Her glance was caught of a sudden by the white immobility of her cousin's countenance as the latter stood by the unrailed transfixed by delight and adoration. Instantly a shade of color dropped from Thoroughly's cheeks only to rush back as quickly in a hotter deeper flood of disordered emotions. Her recognition of the small slender figure had been immediate and no less swift had been a tumult of conflict in her brain and heart as to what she ought to do. Her impulse prompted her head to nod, her lips to curve in a smile of old affection and her spirit to burn its lamps of loyalty and welcome in her eyes. Her calculation and underlying consciousness of the obligation due to Alice van Kirk relentlessly put on their check. Confused, incapable of weighing a matter so unexpectedly confronting her judgment for decision, she did nothing at all, save to grasp but control of her faculties, and her cousin decided in her stead already convinced that she was gazing at Princess Thervinia. The pale little hero worshipper merely blanched a bit whiter, thus to be detected at her staring, fluttered her eyes in an effort to recover her wavering wits of the horses in the ring. Thurley rose and met the solicitous scrutiny of Alice's eyes. She smiled with a forced restoration of her poise, her one desire now being to escape as soon as possible. Shall we go? She said, it must be nearly over. By all means, my dear, Alice answered gladly, and the evening's farewells were quickly quietly exchanged. Still, in a lingering haze of doubt unrest and trifling apprehension, lest the presence of her cousin in the town might possibly compromise or even jeopardize her new position in the social world, Thurley followed mechanically where their escorts led the way. Then out in the marble corridor of the building, facing the draft of November air swept in through the open doors, she received again a peculiar wireless shot for which she could have supplied no explanation. That same foreign-looking woman of the pale olive face, and ice-blue eyes was standing over against the wall, her gaze hard set and concentrated on Thurley's striking features. Again, that sense of something baleful and menacing tinged the girl's nerves with chill as she met the glitter of the other woman's scrutiny. She did not observe a small dark man with eyes as shifty as those of a coon who glanced from herself to the woman by the wall, then leisurely followed from the place. Almost with the same alacrity with which a carriage attendant outside summoned Alice's car to receive its passengers, a second such person called up a nearby taxi-cad into which the small dark man was fairly shunted. When Alice's car rolled up the avenue, the other tagged it unobtrusively at a distance of discretion in the rear. End of chapter 13. Chapter 14. A Triumph and a Jar For Thurley, the horse show was over while the consequences of her appearance there had only as yet to be seen. The story of the Thurley and the Thurley and the Thurley and the Thurley and the Thurley and the Thurley and the Thurley For the two or three days next ensuing she was dimly aware of a small, gnawing, worry that robbed her pleasure of its fullest charm. She wondered a thousand of times if she had played the generous, creditable part in withholding her look of recognition from her cousin. Time after time she informed herself that she had followed only possible course that no good purpose could have been served by betraying her real identity to one so far removed from herself by everything of life, yet the haunting reflections still remain that her cousin had been denied. For a much briefer time her mind was concerned with the image of that other woman's face and its insistent eyes. All worries were presently swept away, however, in the wonderful tumult of pleasures and experiences impinging on her changed existence. Magic followed magic. At the conjuring of money and her own inherent charm, like an avalanche of dream imaginings all wondrously rendered true, the favors of the gods were tumbling, gliding and flowing in upon her. Wardrobes, jewels, the costliest furs, her own imported car and retinue of servants, and a bank account of startling proportions entirely her own and subject only to her regal little self. As she was sought from noon till midnight by a hundred exclusive cliques among the women, she was courted flattered, worshipped by a score of young princes of wealth. Into the maelstrom of beings whose sole occupation is to woo cajole and entice pleasures to their grasp, she was whirled with dizzying velocity. Her feeling of security increased. Worries and apprehensions subsided rapidly in the conquering flood of everyday success. Her confidence became established together with a mastery of herself and the situation, precisely as she felt her sense of mastery over horses and the giant forces of her car. The opera season opened at the psychological moment when her new assurance had lent the final polish to her girlishly regal ways. The metropolitan premiere was a night of dazzling triumph for Alice as well as her protégé. Neither overdressed nor over-jeweled, thoroughly was a vision of ethereal beauty and imperial grace, dividing with the wonderful music and power of Aida the honors of the evening. She was exquisite, as rare as an orchid and at times as wholly unconscious of her loveliness. She was deeply moved by the searching voluptuous enchantment of the epic, thus uttered forth in melody and in such mood drifted far from herself and far from the mimic play of which she was the center. She was watched from afar or from near at hand by whole blocks of box occupants and spectators seated less favorably in the orchestra stalls. Not one of herself created satellites was absent from the house. Count Faishi, Woods, Robby Stiverand, poor would-be-busy Willie Stetson, algae-dearborn of near fame in limericks, the German nobleman, the Canadian officer, and a baker's dozens of less aggressive and persistent hopefuls were as near her as money and activity could place them. Not one in all the inventory had been permitted since the night of the horse show, so to ingratiate himself with Alice as to have five whole minutes alone with her monarchal little charge. The pent-up volcanics between them were therefore bordering on a state of eruption and counter-eruption, more or less menacing to each. This particular night afforded scant of any opportunity even to the most sagacious to steal a march upon his fellow conspirators. Thoroughly was, as it were, equally divided among them all, a fact affording intense of only temporary gratification to at least one little creature, Mildred Gray, who could almost have torn the princess to shreds for having cast her spell all unwittingly upon the Willie Stetson elsewhere mentioned. But that night inaugurated changes. It ignited all the glare and incense of the social ritual, casting a blinding refulgence and an intoxicating fragrance of narcotic essences through all the gilded halls of pleasure. And it struck into being, in Thoroughly Ruckston's nature, a tiny spark of wanton joy in her power, a spark that has burned the heart of many of her sex to a cold black crisp at last. Something had echoed in her overflattered self, the mad desire for wealth, position, and power that had steeled her resolve when Galard threw her off that far back night in New Haven. It would be so good to retaliate, to flirt with men, to urge them on to play upon their fondest dreams and hopes, only to crush them at the end. It would salve so thoroughly the wounds Acton Gaylor had made in her heart to treat all his kind, as he had treated her, as a hundred of his ilk were daily treating the college widows of her town. She felt as if righteous indignation might almost have been delegated to herself from all college widows, power to punish for the punishments that scores and hundreds had endured. The power was hers at last. Without a realising sense of all that was occurring, she had achieved at a bound that very position she coveted so intently, and resolved to have on the night of her anguish and her utter mortification. She did not actually resolve to assume the grim role of nemesis to all the moths already drawn to her light, for a certain heartlessness in such deliberate intent was more or less impossible to her nature. She did, however, breathe fire and excitement in the consciousness of mighty power laid almost unbidden in her grasp. Moreover, she had promised Alice Van Kirk that she would not permit her heart to become seriously entangled for a year. If the men would come, many of them in sincere self-seeking and scheming, they would scarcely be so defenseless and trusting as she had one time been. The hour and the world had been laid at her feet, and the thought made her drunk with delight. She thought of half a dozen men at once, with whom a tilt at the game of hearts would be only harmless diversion. She could not shut them from her life, nor think of them seriously for half a moment. She mentally bunched them like asparagus, and tied them about the waist. There was one, however, not included, either in the group of vegetable sprouts, or her half-formed intent to enjoy her wondrous power. The one was robbly stivered, somewhat sacredly set apart. She told herself it was merely for his wrist that he must be spared, but the hour of their meeting and the way thereof was rarely absent from her thoughts. Tonight, as a theme of the music and the play entwined a spell of tenderness, romance, and exultation, with her thought she could not surrender to a mere desire to exercise a selfish motive. Dreams of her past, some old, some as new as the hour in which she drove Stiverin's car crept subtly to her heart, and kindled a glow as sweetly wholesome as the fire on a homely hearth. The hour was one not soon to be repeated, where she hovered like a girl emerging from the trust and innocence of youth to woman's conception of the world. In it were mingled all her old unworldliness, and a dawning appreciation of the sovereignty thus magically bestowed upon her being. She loved her new-made power intensely. She loved the elegance, comfort, and beauty made possible by the life into which, in the argacy of fate, she had drifted thus incredibly. There was one thing missing only—someone to whom to tell it all, someone dear enough and near enough to share her joy, and the wonder of such an occurrence. Someone who mutual trust and love would single out for such a comradeship that all they knew and felt and hoped must forever be divided between them. The ghost of Galard strayed like a mist through the glowing halls of her thought. He and she had once been so near, this very sort of partnership and trust. A pang in another reoccurrence of her growing desire to repay his kind succeeded her momentary longing. And then her gaze, which had focused for a moment on the vagueness of dreams, swung out across the brilliant scene presented by the audience, and met the watchful eyes of Robly Stiverand, seated nearby in the box. A quaint little exaltation leaped in her heart at the sheer audacity and boldness of love encountered in his glances. It swept her for a moment away with himself to the car in the open park. Then she cast off the charm as she might have cast a chain, the links of which, though golden, lustrous, and light to bear, she would not consent to lock upon her arms. From box to box her eager attention sped, lingering here and there on the brilliant iridescence of diamonds and pearls that flashed from necklaces, tiaras, and even coronettes where woman gowned and bewildering richness and beauty vied with one another in display. And then, as before, sheer ravishment of melody where the blended perfections of the orchestration uttered the joys and anguishes of souls at the brink of climax, caught up her soul, and she was wafted out on an azure sea where nothing of earth could exist. She was never able clearly to recall the kaleidoscopic panorama of sensations and emotions suggested, presented and withdrawn that wonderful night, her first of a kind which could never be repeated. She touched the heights of ecstasy and was floating blindly across the abyss that yawned below. She realized a little of the triumph that she herself achieved. For the greater part, however, it was all a blur of pleasures dazzling and indefinite as the sun brightly flashing in amist. Not even the wondrous supper afterward made a clean cut impression on her mind, except that it, like all the rest, was perfect in its way with more bright music people, joy and irresponsibility. The one thing of the night destined to remain peculiarly vivid came last of all in her own boudoir when she was once more at home. It was merely a letter from the cousin she had seen by the rail at the horse-show from her height above the crowd. It had been to New Haven then to the office of Major Phipps, who had brought it here himself, with something akin to a chill at her heart, thoroughly opened and read the missive. It was brief, a mere recital of the fact that the cousin had recently seen someone who reminded her so much of her one remaining relative that she had to sit down and write. If thoroughly was living anywhere within reach and received this letter, perhaps they could meet. I am a little discouraged and lonesome, the letter presently concluded, and I'm sure it would do me good to see you again. I often think of you as the only real cheer I have had in many years. I hope this may find you and sufficiently arouse your former affection to make you wish to write you wish to write at once and arrange a possible meeting with your fond and faithful cousin, Edith's Deck. To thoroughly's own amazement she could not or did not immediately decide what course she should adopt. For two or three days the matter drifted, but thoroughly did not forget. End of chapter 14. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Paul Hansen. Thoroughly Ruxton by Philip Viral Miguel's. Chapter 15. The Flaw in the Gem. Had one more element of excitement been required to render the situation breathless with possibilities, it was supplied on the night of the junior chrysanthemum ball which opened the season of dancing at one of the Great Fifth Avenue Hotels. The New York Evening Star in its final edition came out with a redly blazing story announcing not only that Princess Thervinia was now well known to be disporting herself with royal grace and Gotham, but that recent telegraphic and cable intelligence had established the fact that she had practically run away from her kingdom with intent to make an American alliance that should be prompted solely by her heart. This was not all. Her fiancee of Blood Royal, no less a person than the Duke of Sax, Hertzenheimer, reported intensely fond of her ladyship and greatly afflicted by her new adventure, and this manifestation of her headstrong nature had likewise disappeared from the kingdom of Herzegotha, and his absence together with that of the Princess was causing grave uneasiness at the royal court, despite obvious efforts to conceal the truth of the rumors. An intensified thrill and tingle shot along the delicate nerves that articulate all Sweldom as this newest sensation was devoured. At twenty dinners that preceded the dance, marvelous little functions of brilliance and charm, the topic was all of Princess Thervinia masquerading at Alice van Kirk's. New hope had instantly arisen not only in the breasts of the eligible men, both young and old, but as well in the visions of fond and planting mothers for whose sons their ambitions soared, if possible, beyond even the pearly gates. Here to fore only vague wonder as to what the visit of Princess might imply had been practicable. Information that she had come to America seeking a mate of her heart inflamed the wildest aspirations. By nine o'clock an astonishing number of the guests were present at the decorated ballroom which art and expense had converted into a veritable bower of roses and orchids. Never had the arrivals been so prompt or the feeling in the air so electrically charged. At half past nine Alice and Thurley appeared and the palpitant sensations increased. Thurley had never been more radiant or winning. From her exquisitely arched little feet to the trembling diamond in her hair she was the daintiest possible embodiment of loveliness. A rose might indeed have chosen her to be its own ambassador, to carry its fragrance, its wine warm color and its irresistible appeal to the court of beauty's final judgment. New jewels of her own selection reposed on the velvet of her neck. It was that they were made more lovely by their association with herself, not that she was beautified by them. A new inspiration of a gossamer gown cut modestly low and molded in perfection on her lithe and rounded figure and apparently a new mood of brightness in her eyes and heart. Combined to create a gasp of ecstasy and envy on the lips of every woman who beheld her and to set the hearts of all the men aflame. She and Alice were immediately besieged. It seemed as if all men in the place were determined to be the first at her side. In the palm room in the finery and in the ballroom proper vexed girls were deserted and droves. Poor little Mildred Gray who had witnessed Willie Stetson's eager and helpless homage to the princess before was already pent with tears and indignation. There was one consolation only to bevvies of sweet pretty girl confections and this was that dancing must soon begin and thoroughly could at most dance with only one man at a time. Immaculate Harry Batch Stowe led the grand march which began a little before ten. His partner was a last season's beauty Eleanor Atteray Beekman. Thorley's lot fell to Kelsey Woods largely in response to wishes that Alice had earlier expressed. Kelsey indeed had been one of their party at dinner also by Alice's design. She was extracting almost fiendish delight and alluring woods from the circle of one of her rivals who had queened it last season if not with an iron at least with a golden rod. Woods usurped the gladness of a king. Thistledown could scarcely have been lighter in his arms as he and Thorley moved over the floor. I say, said he in his candid fashion, you've translated beauty into this sort of thing, you know. What do you think such riding and dancing must do to a fellow's heart? Thorley smiled in his eyes. But I ride on a horse and dance on the floor. A heart wouldn't be at all appropriate for either. Nevertheless, he declared, mine is beneath your feet. Oh, isn't it hard and nicely polished? He tried again. Couldn't we ride a bit together soon? I shan't be real happy till we do. I'm sorry this dance makes you so miserable, she answered. Cheer up, it will soon be over. Oh, you do chaff a fellow, he murmured with a grin. But you haven't answered about the riding. You've no idea how much it would please me, again she smiled. Is it my duty to keep big boys amused? I say, he demanded desperately, will you go riding with me, yes or no? Her eyes burned brighter. Perhaps. Oh, Lord, he said, well, at least you're dancing with me now, that's something. But not much, she added. I adore it upon my honor, he breathed ardently. But I'm a silly ass. You are very frank. She was enormously amused at his blunders. He flushed to the tips of his ears. I mean, in the things I say, I mean, the way I say them, the way they sound, confound it, may not a dunce mean what he says. I'm in a ballet mix, you know. Reversion to my English schooling. I do that sort of thing with exasperating regularity. But I'm really not so stupid as I seem, in fact, and I do adore this dance with you, Ms. Thurley. In fact, I will don't spoil the explanation, please, she interrupted. I think I understand it fully. Tenacity was one of his properties. He looked in her eyes. Shall we say tomorrow afternoon, then, for a dash in the park? Not tomorrow afternoon. Will you set a day? Will you abide by my selection? Absolutely. He was all but trembling with excitement and joy. She was quite grave. Well, then, say we ride on Judgment Day, about three in the afternoon, unless it rains. He groaned, I know what it means. You have never forgiven my ballet interference, but your horse was running away. She was instantly serious. Oh, indeed, Mr. Woods, I thoroughly appreciated your splendid intention. It was splendid, and your horse must be superbly swift. His pleasure returned like a homing pigeon. Will you accept him, Ms. Thurley, as a gift? Oh, dear me, no, she answered girlishly. I couldn't possibly ride to it once, and I shouldn't think of surrounding cataract, my wild cataract, that leaps in glory. I think we could beat you in a race, a hope was flushed on his mind. Will you try? Yes, on Judgment Day, at three. The music ceased. The evening had begun. It became another of the triumphs that Thurley made no effort to achieve. It was a brilliant intoxicating conclave of the goddesses of music, beauty, and motion. On the breath of perfume and the wave of rhythm, all manner of love crept subtly forth. The passionate with the tender, the bold with the timid, the selfish with the pure, youths and men, the eager swains who were granted the ecstasy of holding Thurley in their arms for a brief, bewildering rotation in the maze of the music spell succumbed both with and against their wills to the magic of her personality. Stivernt was there. He was miserable and exuberant together, consumed within patience and despair as he watched her dancing with and smiling upon her various partners, and vibrant with rapture when she spent a moment at his side. He was not dancing. With his right arm suspended in a sling the feet was awkward to extinction. But Thurley had granted him one of her numbers, which he meant to spend in the fernary, apart from the dazzle of the ballroom and the insistence of the music. Meantime, for Thurley, the one particular variant of the evening was supplied in the various speeches and devices men chose to divulge sudden love. There was a certain eloquence in awkward feet, as well as in stammered speech in all revealing glance. With each and every supplicant she smiled and exchanged bright froths of nothingness. It was not altogether amusing except as a clever fencer is amused at the thrusts and attacks of a round of antagonists, a few either clever or diabolical, but many slow, uncertain and unskilled. She danced and fenced with Willie Stetson and found him merely an overeager boy whose one idea was to take her for a drive at any hour she liked to any place she preferred and in any sort of conveyance of her whim. There could be no doubt of his per-blind adoration. His very knees were aching for contact with the floor anywhere about his feet. Another of her more or less pup-like idolatres was Algy Dearborn, bitten by the malignant germ that incites its victim to the perpetuation of limricks. He held her in an engine-like embrace and cranked all over the floor, abandoning his trolley, so to speak, with cheerful and insistent disregard, and thereby colliding with everyone remotely adjacent. You're an awfully jolly good dancer, he imparted delightedly. I can really dance myself when I have such a partner as you, thoroughly assumed her gravest expression. Perhaps I can get you one somewhere. What for, he inquired in all earnestness, am I not dancing with you? We are getting around, said thoroughly, famously. Do you know, he continued as pleased as punch, you've inspired me like the Dickens. I wrote a new poem that very first day we met. Why, how complimentary. Wait till you hear it, want to? I am dying with impatience or something. Her eyes look very much alive. He cranked about in nearly telescope to fellow dancer's face, with his shoulder blade driving for an opening in which to utter his gem. It's real short, he said regretfully, but I think rather above my average, if I can remember it right, oh yes, it goes like this. A mouse with a fine sense of humor said, oh the ridiculous rumor that women have spunk, and gee what a funk, when he nimbled a surrogate bloomer. Rather neat, I think, and right to the point, there's another working in me now. Do you know, Miss Thurley, I believe you are going to give my particular genius more inspiration than anyone I've ever met. Thurley smiled divinely. Is there anyone who might possibly give your genius a coup de gras? Well, I don't know, I hope not, why? Oh, one can never tell what may happen. Some beings have such an erratic frenzy for usefulness. Yes, haven't they, said Algie, at trifle hazy as to what her observations might imply. But I think I've got such a good grip on the muse that she isn't likely to get away. Thurley's sympathy with the muse was heightened as he closed his iron levers yet more rigidly about her. He continued with his declarations of her usefulness to his inspiration and otherwise revealed his honest, if somewhat ponderous sense of adoration, and then that dance was happily ended, and Count Faishi succeeded to his place. The Count had been accumulating the lavas and heats of his nature in his accustomed Vesuvian style for several days. He had fretted in apprehensive impatience every hour since last he had been permitted a word with Thurley alone. He was intensely excited now by the prospect of taking her all to himself into the added intoxication of the waltz. Valgmy deus, he breathed her rapturously. I am more favored than the tropics. My heart is more making tumult than the seas. It is the glory of you so long by me sought. It is my reward for devotion, burning forever like the altar lamp not to be extinguished. Ah, to quench a little of that burning thirst which my heart had blister. It is the sea of ecstasy shall enfold me. Thurley knew not whether to be amused or alarmed at his attitude and utterance. His eyes were certainly blazing with something was not altogether comfortable, and beneath the handsome olive smoothness of his complexion surged a color that played like moving flame. Much of his ardor she felt inclined to ascribe to the habit of his mind. Nevertheless he had much rather habit diffused in a company she thought than cope with it thus alone. She could adapt only her ordinary tactics, a smile unequipped to meet his phrases. Are you not afraid to mix your metaphors so recklessly, she asked? Might not the sea you mentioned engulf the lamp? Ah, even so. I have yet another lamp, more seas, more everything. It is my nature. With my love I will wither that sea. The rosebud shall blossom now, now at the touch of this sunshine, this glory of my love, this music, a nothing, one pulsation of my heart. This dance with you, my soul. He was destined never to conclude the rhapsody. Algae dearborn cranking by and repeating his mouse-bitten limerick jolted the ribs, heart, wind, and seat of volcanics in the Count's anatomy, with a contact so violent that immediate recovery was impractical. The Count seized emptying and dancing. They walked, Thurley's friendship went out to the gripper of the muse forthwith. Oh, mustn't football be splendid when the right people play, she said with less irreverence than Faishi might have imagined. Interference is such an unexpected art. Not here, he answered emphatically. He took her arm in the circle of his arm and resumed a somewhat less soul-levitating locomotion. For a minute or more he was content to accumulate breath and scattered senses, but he was guiding Thurley with new intent along the edge of the room toward the moor sequestered fernary, where at times a couple detached from the assemblage of dancers took a turn for a moment alone. Perhaps football would be inappropriate here, Thurley agreed innocently. But I should be delighted to see you in a game. Football. Ah, he answered, slightly shrugging his shoulders. A game for mere animals. It lacks finesse. But not finish, said Thurley. Some people like it for that. But the game par excellence. Ah, love. Love. It is here you shall better wish to see me. The white heat of my soul. The fire of divine in the blood. The beautiful madness of adoration. Ah, to know this intensity. To shame the winds. To soar upon the whirlwind. To out-distance the star with the deeps. The expanses of love. Uh, wouldn't that be a long way out and lonely? asked Thurley gravely. Closer inshore is just as comfortable and there's a jolly crowd. He looked in her eyes in his fiery fashion. You do not understand, he said, to mask his own non-comprehension of her answer. Ah, but you shall divinity. The marvel of your being. This shall understand. He had managed, not without skill and adroitness, to pilot her quite to the farther end of the fernary, where the dimmest glow of a golden bulb was softly diffused in the shadows. He halted here and stood, as if about to resume the dance, with his arms about her waist. His face had paled with intensified excitement. Thurley feared he might have been seriously hurt by the blow from Dearborn's elbow. You are injured, she said, you. You shouldn't attempt. I am born again, new. The child of love, he interrupted abruptly, his voice a mere murmur of vibrant syllables. It is ours, the world. Eden, the path of roses, the grottoes of fragrances. Ours for love and yet more love. My miracle of beauty. He led her, drew her unexpectedly into the dimmest recess of the ferns before she could realize his intentions, resist, or gasp at astonished protest at what he was saying. Adored divinity, essence of my soul, he added in the madness of his passion, and drawing her closer still helpless from the unexpectedness of the whole affair, he attempted to kiss her on the lips. She was instantly struggling incensed and frightened. She avoided the contact loath by all her being, yet he kissed her once on the burning curve of her cheek before she could thrust him away. Count Faishi, she cried. Oh, the shame! But God, my love, he answered wildly, attempting to still her struggles. Princess, my love, you must discover you. With all her fine young strength, she cast him backward. He all that fell against the monster's jardinaire and broke a fron from the fern it held in recovering his balance. Thorley started once for the door that led to the lighted hall beyond. The music had ceased. She almost collided with a man dimly seen through blurring tears of anger. It was robbly stivered. Miss Thorley, he said, may I claim, oh yes, take me out, please, anywhere. She interrupted struggling desperately to conceal her agitation. The warmth, perhaps I have danced too hard. She took his arm, her strength fairly wilting, as she felt the sense of his protecting presence. She did not look where the Count had recovered both his balance and his wits. He dared step actively forward. But, ma'am, zeal Thorley, shall it not be my privilege to return you to Madame Van Kirk? His very effrontery revitalized her poise and self-control. Thank you, Count Faishi. It will not be necessary now. She bowed and even smiled as Stivert urged her gently forward. Then, at the entrance to the larger room, she received a second staggering shock to nerves already tingling. A tall, athletic figure had appeared in the lighted frame of the arch and halted to stand aside that she and Stivert might pass. It was Acton Gaylord, and his startled glance was fixed on Thorley's face, as if he had seen an apparition. For one brief second her eyes encountered his, too amazed to betray recognition. Then, demanding the utmost of her shaken strength, she continued past him, coldly while he as rigidly passed within, to conclude a search for Faishi.