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She looked into his laughing eyes with her clear, stedfast, gravely questioning blue ones. “Do not you Americans know that it is not the fashion here, in Germany, for the young men and the young women to walk together–unless they are VERLOBT?”

“VER–which?”

“Engaged.” She nodded her head thrice: viciously, decidedly, mischievously.

“So much the better.”

“ACH GOTT!” She made a gesture of hopelessness at his incorrigibility, and again attempted to withdraw her hands.

“I must go now.”

“Well then, good-by.”

It was easy to draw her closer by simply lowering her still captive hands. Then he suddenly kissed her coldly startled lips, and instantly released her. She as instantly vanished.

“Elsbeth,” he called quickly. “Elsbeth!”

Her now really frightened face reappeared with a heightened color from the dense foliage–quite to his astonishment.

“Hush,” she said, with her finger on her lips. “Are you mad?”

“I only wanted to remind you to square me with the Princess,” he laughed as her head disappeared.

He strolled back toward the gate. Scarcely had he quitted the shrubbery before the same chasseur made his appearance with precisely the same salute; and, keeping exactly the same distance, accompanied him to the gate. At the corner of the street he hailed a droshky and was driven to his hotel.

The landlord came up smiling. He trusted that the Herr had greatly enjoyed himself at the Schloss. It was a distinguished honor–in fact, quite unprecedented. Hoffman, while he determined not to commit himself, nor his late fair companion, was nevertheless anxious to learn something more of her relations to the Schloss. So pretty, so characteristic, and marked a figure must be well known to sightseers. Indeed, once or twice the idea had crossed his mind with a slightly jealous twinge that left him more conscious of the impression she had made on him than he had deemed possible. He asked if the model farm and dairy were always shown by the same attendants.

“ACH GOTT! no doubt, yes; His Royal Highness had quite a retinue when he was in residence.”

“And were these attendants in costume?”

“There was undoubtedly a livery for the servants.”

Hoffman felt a slight republican irritation at the epithet–he knew not why. But this costume was rather a historical one; surely it was not entrusted to everyday menials–and he briefly described it.

His host’s blank curiosity suddenly changed to a look of mysterious and arch intelligence.

“ACH GOTT! yes!” He remembered now (with his finger on his nose) that when there was a fest at the Schloss the farm and dairy were filled with shepherdesses, in quaint costume worn by the ladies of the Grand Duke’s own theatrical company, who assumed the characters with great vivacity. Surely it was the same, and the Grand Duke had treated the Herr to this special courtesy. Yes–there was one pretty, blonde young lady–the Fraulein Wimpfenbuttel, a most popular soubrette, who would play it to the life! And the description fitted her to a hair! Ah, there was no doubt of it; many persons, indeed, had been so deceived.

But happily, now that he had given him the wink, the Herr could corroborate it himself by going to the theater tonight. Ah, it would be a great joke–quite colossal! if he took a front seat where she could see him. And the good man rubbed his hands in gleeful anticipation.

Hoffman had listened to him with a slow repugnance that was only equal to his gradual conviction that the explanation was a true one, and that he himself had been ridiculously deceived. The mystery of his fair companion’s costume, which he had accepted as part of the “show”; the inconsistency of her manner and her evident occupation; her undeniable wish to terminate the whole episode with that single interview; her mingling of worldly aplomb and rustic innocence; her perfect self-control and experienced acceptance of his gallantry under the simulated attitude of simplicity–all now struck him as perfectly comprehensible. He recalled the actress’s inimitable touch in certain picturesque realistic details in the dairy–which she had not spared him; he recognized it now even in their bowered confidences (how like a pretty ballet scene their whole interview on the rustic bench was!), and it breathed through their entire conversation–to their theatrical parting at the close! And the whole story of the photograph was, no doubt, as pure a dramatic invention as the rest! The Princess’s romantic interest in him–that Princess who had never appeared (why had he not detected the old, well-worn, sentimental situation here?)–was all a part of it. The dark, mysterious hint of his persecution by the police was a necessary culmination to the little farce. Thank Heaven! he had not “risen” at the Princess, even if he had given himself away to the clever actress in her own humble role. Then the humor of the whole situation predominated and he laughed until the tears came to his eyes, and his forgotten ancestors might have turned over in their graves without his heeding them. And with this humanizing influence upon him he went to the theater.