Princess Maritza | Page 3

are not so
very wise and old yourself, are you?"
"Indeed, no; I fancy I am more of a fool than anything else," he
laughed.
"You should not let yourself think that," she said gravely. "To think
highly of one's powers is half-way to success. That sounds as if I had
stolen something from a copy-book, doesn't it? But no, I am speaking
from experience. Why do you laugh? Some of us have to touch life's
hardships early."
"You do not show the marks of such experience," said Ellerey, hardly
knowing whether to treat her seriously or not.
"No, but I might, were I conscious of what is before me. I am not as
other girls. There is a destiny I have to struggle towards, an end I must
win. It was born into, handed down in my blood through generations of
men of action. The ambition of those generations of men beats to-day
in the heart of a woman. It is a pity, but I shall win, or die fighting."
"At least the spirit in you deserves success."
"Come a little this way," she said, touching his arm, and then she

pointed down into the valley below them. "Do you see that building
yonder, white among the trees, with a point of conical roof at the end of
it?"
"Yes."
"Do you know what it is?"
"No."
"By this time they are hunting for me all over that place down there. I
heard the bell ring half an hour ago. That's a school, a big, expensive,
fashionable school, where they teach young ladies how to behave
properly, how to grow up to rule those fighting men we were speaking
of, how to fit themselves to be their wives, and in due time the mothers
of their children--in short, how to fulfil their destiny, woman's destiny.
They are trying to teach me."
"You? Then--"
"Yes, I'm one of the girls there, and I've played truant, and--yes, I think
I shall go back presently, when I have taken my fill of freedom and this
glorious morning." "And will get punished, I am afraid," said Ellerey.
"Perhaps; but it will not be very heavy punishment. It is strange, but
they rather like me there, in spite of everything."
"I do not think that is strange at all."
"No, you wouldn't; you're a man," she answered quickly, "and men are
weak where attractive women are concerned, all the world over."
Such a declaration coming from a truant schoolgirl somewhat startled
Ellerey, and yet, as he looked at her, he was more conscious of the
woman than the girl.
"Oh, yes, I know I am attractive," she went on, and there was no
deepening of the color in her face as she said it. "I am glad that it is so.
My looks will help me when the work of my life begins in earnest,

when I have played the truant from school for the last time, and do not
go back."
"Then you intend to run away eventually?"
"Yes, unless another way should seem better. That shocks you. I often
shock them down at the white house yonder, and they excuse me
because I am a foreigner. You English are so polite. You do not seem
to expect foreigners to know how to behave, and you make excuses for
them. It is very funny. It makes me laugh," and she laughed so merrily
that her former gravity seemed more unnatural.
"You speak English perfectly. I should not have taken you for a
foreigner," said Ellerey.
"And French, and German, and my own tongue, I speak them all
perfectly. I have lived in all these countries. It was necessary."
"And you do not like England nor Englishmen?"
"I have not said so," she answered; "but here in England I am being
taken care of, kept out of mischief, and sometimes I feel like a prisoner.
It is only that which makes me dislike England. Of Englishmen I know
little, but I have read about them, and they have done some good, brave
deeds. They are, perhaps, just a little conceited with themselves, don't
you think? There is no one quite like an Englishman it would seem."
"There are all sorts, good and bad," said Ellerey carelessly. "At the best
he wants a lot of beating; at the worst, well, he wants a lot of beating
that way, too. How is it you feel like a prisoner?"
The girl drew herself up to her full height. There was something
haughty in her demeanor, occasioned, perhaps, by the careless way in
which he asked the question. She felt that he was treating her rather like
a spoilt child, while she felt herself a determined woman.
"In my own country I am a princess," she said.

"Indeed?"
"You do not