“Don’t, if you take my advice. She will insist on nursing you--rather like it than otherwise. As to your finding it a bore to go out with her----” “I shouldn’t, if I wasn’t engaged to her,” groaned Caerleon. “Oh, Lothario!” laughed Cyril, but he forbore to pursue the subject further. He was so highly delighted by the unexpected success of his diplomacy that he could afford to be generous. How the Princess had managed to draw Caerleon into the engagement he could not guess, but he was the last man in the world to quarrel with the accomplished fact. He could stand a good deal from Caerleon in these days, he told himself, taking credit for extraordinary forbearance towards a fellow who was as bad as a bear with a sore head. Why couldn’t he put a good face on it, as the Princess did? She had been obliged to discard her old love, but she didn’t let the fact spoil all her enjoyment of life--not she. As will have been observed, Caerleon’s task was not made easier by his _fiancée_. Princess Ottilie saw the full comedy of the situation, where he perceived only its tragic irony, and she took a lively pleasure in emphasising the details of the plot. A born actress, no mere tame acceptance of facts would content her, and she played shamelessly to the gallery. Ordinary love-making was poor,--everything for her must be intense, and surcharged with meaning. She never left Caerleon alone. Loving epithets flowed from her lips in a way that made him feel that he must be blushing scarlet a dozen times a-day. She claimed his time and attention as a right, obliged him to assist her in the most incongruous tasks, made him turn over the pages of her music for her during what seemed interminable hours (she was a most accomplished musician), and appealed in an injured tone to Cyril, or the Queen, or the ladies-in-waiting, if he showed signs of fatigue or preoccupation. The general effect produced was that of a modern and substantial Titania wooing a singularly unresponsive clown, to the great edification of the beholders. CHAPTER XIII. PUNIC FAITH.