"He does as a rule; but then, you see, Blu—my lord," and while she spoke she held a bonbon out tantalisingly before my eyes, "you have got to play a different part from the ordinary one of a lover to a princess. You will play it, won't you—Adrian?"
"I'll play anything," I said, much agitated by the last word she uttered.
"Bueno! Well, now, see. You must be a humble lover—one beneath me, with whom I have fallen in love in a manner discreditable to my rank. And, thereby, you will make my suitor jealous—oh! so jealous—because we will play such tricks upon him that he will renounce me. Oh! I have invented such schemes to make him do so. Neither Quevedo nor Vega ever thought of such tricks."
"It will be a dangerous game," I said meditatively.
"Dangerous! Dangerous!" she exclaimed. "Why, Blue Eyes, you are not afraid of a Spanish don although he is of the royal house, are you? Fie! and you a soldier."
"That isn't the danger I meant," I replied quietly, so quietly that she guessed my meaning in a moment, as I saw by the rich crimson which mantled her cheek instantly, and the increased brilliancy of her lovely, starlike eyes.
"Dangerous to whom, pray?" she demanded.
"To me!" I answered boldly; "because I shall lo——"
"Hsh! hsh! hsh!" she said, putting her hand up quickly. "None of that! none of that! Yet, nevertheless, there will be danger—to——"
"Whom?" I asked now.