“Don’t let us talk nonsense,” said Hugh, annoyed. Could it be true that he looked brighter after mixing with a crowd of silly people, who lived to waste time in amusing themselves? The very next morning he was down to breakfast somewhat earlier, to keep an appointment with a patient, when Ralph came in, all eagerness. A letter was in his hand. “From the princess, father,” he said. “A footman brought it, and is waiting for an answer.” “Well, let him wait,” said Hugh, once more flushing with annoyance. (Why his son’s _empressement?_) “He says one word will do,” said Ralph, pleadingly. “What is the matter with you?” asked his father, with an embarrassed laugh, taking up the dainty little note addressed to “Monsieur le Docteur Paull,” in a weak but pretty handwriting. “There,” he said, suddenly, by some curious impulse handing the open note to the lad. “I don’t know what to do. You shall decide.” The note contained but a few words: “Cher Monsieur,—I will ask you as a great kindness to me to give me your advice, when and how it pleases you. Receive my compliments. “MERCEDES (PRINCESS ANDRIOCCHI).” “Decide?” Ralph stared at his father. “Shall I go, or not?” said Hugh. “What else would you do, father?” said his son, astonished. He scarcely understood—he had never known his father refuse advice to a patient. “Look here,” said Dr. Paull, throwing himself back in his chair. “This is a fashionable, selfish woman, who has really nothing the matter with her. If I go, it is merely truckling to her position and wealth.” “Has she consulted you before, then?” said the boy, seriously. He was naturally serious, and in the most minor matters, which had any reference to his father, he was preternaturally so. “No, I have not seen her professionally, exactly,” admitted Hugh. “You once told me, father, that no man, however gifted in diagnosis, should pronounce upon a patient without making an—what was the word?—an exhaustive examination.” “Does that mean I ought to go?” “Why not?” Hugh looked into the earnest blue eyes which, despite the lad’s years, had still an almost infantine expression. “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings one often hears the truth,” he thought. “I suppose I must go, then,” he said, “although it is most inconvenient,” and abruptly rising he went into the hall, spoke to the man, and returned pledged to see the princess. He was set down for a clinical lecture at noon. At eleven he started in his brougham and drove to one of the new roads in South Kensington where the Prince Andriocchi rented a furnished house for the season. An English groom of the chambers came forward as the door opened. The princess was at home. Hugh followed the man, who wore a dress something akin to ordinary levée costume, up the wide staircase, through the large, silent drawing-rooms which were furnished in the Parisian style rather than according to British taste, into a boudoir where he left him.