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 XVII

INGENIOUS COLONEL STAFNITZ

FTER his happy holiday the Prince slept well, and rose in a cheerful mood—still joyful of heart. He anticipated that the day would bring him a summons from his father; he had little doubt that in the course of a personal interview he could persuade the King to agree to a postponement of his journey. Of Sophy he meant to say nothing—by a reservation necessary and not inexcusable. It was impossible not to take into account the knowledge he had acquired of the state of the King's health. The result of that condition was that his provision must, in all likelihood, be for months only, and not for years. The task for the months was to avoid disturbing the King's mind, so long as this course was consistent with the maintenance of his own favorable position. It must be remembered that no man in the kingdom built more on this latter object than the King himself; no man was less a partisan of Countess Ellenburg and of young Alexis than the husband of the one and the father of the other. The royal line—the line which boasted Bourbon blood—was for the King the only line of Stefanovitch.

Of the attack prepared against him the Prince knew nothing—nothing even of the King's mind having been turned against the Baroness Dobrava, whom 246