Princess Maritza | Page 3

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 believe me?"
"Why not? You look every inch a princess," he answered.
"It is so like a man to say what he thinks will please," she returned with a flash in her eyes. "You do not believe me, but you are afraid to say so. Go down there and ask them."
"I do not disbelieve you," said Ellerey quietly.
The girl relented in a moment.
"We should be very good friends, you and I, if we knew each other. You have ambition. I can see it in your face."
"I had, Princess."
"Hush, no one calls me that here. Why do you say you had ambition?"
"You would not understand."
"Try me and see," she said, standing close beside him as though to measure her strength against his for a moment. "You may trust me. I would