Page:The Eyes of Max Carrados.pdf/248

246 cated an extract from the daily Press. It was a mere slip of paper and consisted of the following paragraph:

"From Clairvaux, in the Pas de Calais, France, where he purchased a country estate when he was driven into exile, it is reported that ex-King Constantine of Villalyia has been lying dangerously ill for the past week."

"Quite so, quite so," murmured Carlyle, quietly turning over the cutting to satisfy himself that he was reading the right side.

"I see that you haven't anything very hopeful to report," said Mr Enniscorthy—he and Max Carrados had entered Mr Carlyle's office within a minute of each other two days later—"but let me have it out."

"It isn't quite a matter of being hopeful or the reverse," replied the blind man. "It is merely final to your ambition. You know Prince Ulric of Villalyia?"

"I have been presented. He hunted in Ireland last season."

"He knew Miss Roscastle?"

"They were acquainted, she has told me."

"It went deeper than you imagined. Miss Roscastle is Princess Ulric of Villalyia to-day."

"Una! Oh," cried Enniscorthy, "but—but that is impossible! You don't mean that she"

"I mean exactly what I say. They were married within a week of her disappearance from London."

Enniscorthy's pained gaze went from face to face. The fatal presentiment that had always just robbed him of the heroic—the fear that he might be making an ass of himself—again assailed him.

"But isn't Ulric in the line of succession? They