Princess Maritza | Page 4

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 trust you anywhere, in peace or war."
Ellerey looked at her curiously for an instant, with a sudden desire to
take her into his confidence. Then he shook his head slowly. It was
pleasant to hear such faith expressed in him, and he was unwilling to
destroy the faith of this fair woman. Altogether a woman she seemed to
him just then.
"You will not. Never mind, perhaps one day you will. Only never speak
of ambition as something past. That is weak and unmanly."
"Upon my honor, you do me good," Ellerey exclaimed.
"And you me," she answered eagerly. "To look at you makes me feel

strong. It is good when a man makes a woman feel like that. I am a
woman, although I am still at school. There is southern blood in me,
and we become women earlier than English girls do. Listen! There are
England, and France, and Germany, and Austria, and Russia all
interested in me, and nothing would please them all so much as my
death. As it is, I am a difficulty in all their politics. They would like me
to forget who, and what, I am. They would marry me to some
nobleman of no importance, if they could, just to keep me quiet."
"And you will not be quiet."
"No. Why should I be? Would you? In my country a usurper is upon
the throne, kept there, held there, like a child who would fall but for its
nurse's arms, by all the Powers of Europe. It is I who should be there. It
is I who will be there one day. Shall I tell you? There are hundreds,
thousands, of men who are ready to strike in my cause when the time is
ripe. Even now there is a statesman working to set these countries at
cross purposes with one another, and when they quarrel, then is my
opportunity. You shall see. That is why I said I would be a man if I
could. It would be so much easier for a man, but as it is, a woman shall
do it."
"I hope you may. You deserve to."
"But you doubt it?" she said.
"There seem to be heavy odds against you."
"That helps me. It stirs up the best that is in me. It is good to have
something to struggle for, something to win, and if I may not win, I
hope to fall in the press of the fight, and, to the loud funeral music of
clashing steel, find the death of a soldier. What is your name?"
"Desmond Ellerey."
"It is an easy name to remember. Well, Desmond Ellerey, if your
ambition finds no outlet in England, come to my country, to the city of
Sturatzberg, and claim friendship with Princess Maritza. She shall find

you work for your good right arm."
She walked away from him as though she had bestowed a great favor,
never looking back. She went in the opposite direction to the school,
her truant spirit not yet satisfied, and Ellerey watched her until he lost
sight of the tall, graceful figure in a fold of the downs. Then he turned
and went slowly back the way he had come.
Desmond Ellerey had declared that she had done him good. It was true.
Although he walked slowly, his spirit was stirred within him, and his
blood ran with something of its old vigor. Faced by a thousand
difficulties, this girl had the courage to look upon them bravely, and to
believe in her power to overcome them. That was her secret, the belief
in her own power. He had faced his difficulties bravely enough, but he
had not had the courage to hope; therein lay his weakness, and this girl,
this princess, had shown it to him. He had allowed himself to drift into
a backwater; it was time he pulled out into the stream again, and fought
his way back to his rightful place,