Page:Anthony Hope - The Kings Mirror.djvu/388

 "They don't mind smiles there, sire," put in Varvilliers.

"She'll smile not to please them, but because she's amused," said I. "She'll say with her adorable smile, 'This and that I have done, this and that I have not done. Perhaps I did wrong, I have not studied your rules. But you can't send me to hell.

They all appeared to be listening with attentive ears.

"Here's a good advocate," said Wetter. "Let us hear the plea."

You can't send me to hell because I have not pretended. I have been myself, and I didn't make myself. I can't go to hell with the pretenders.

"But to heaven with the kings?" asked Varvilliers.

"With the kings who have not also been pretenders," said I.

"Nom de Dieu," said she, "I believe that I shall escape, after all. So you and I will be separated, Wetter."

"No, no," he protested. "Unless you're there the place won't be itself to me." We all laughed—Struboff not in appreciation, but with a nervous desire to make himself agreeable—and I rose from my seat. It was three o'clock in the morning. Struboff yawned mightily as he drank a final glass and patted his stomach. I think that we were all happier than when we sat down.

"And after the occasion, whither?" I asked them.

"I back to France," answered Varvilliers.

"We to Munich," said Coralie, with a shrug.

"I the deuce knows where," laughed Wetter. "I also the deuce knows where. Come, then, to