“Is there anything you think I ought to do?” asked Usk at last. “Do? What can you do? You are absolutely debarred from enlightening Félicia, as I understand, or even from informing any one else of the circumstances. Obviously, then, the only thing that practically concerns you is the marriage at St Mary Windicotes. That’s your starting-point. I suppose you didn’t think of running down there to look up the register before you went to America?” “No; I had no opportunity.” “Do it when you are next in town, and note especially whether there is that slip of paper pasted on the inside of the cover, or not. It is just possible that Steinherz _père_ made up the whole story on the strength of his likeness to the Archduke, though I allow that would not account for Félicia’s profile. That marriage once established, you are safe in England and America, at any rate, for people know better than to inquire too curiously into the pedigree of heiresses from the States. Of course it would not hold for a moment in Pannonia. There you would have to take your stand on the quasi-ceremony which Steinherz devised to spite his chaplain. If he had lived, it would almost certainly have been annulled on an appeal to Rome by his family, but as he was otherwise disposed of, no doubt they thought the less fuss made the better. As it is, you see, the sole evidence for it is the word of a dead man, for the other witnesses would know better than to testify to it unless the Emperor directed them to open their lips.” “But would it in any circumstance be valid?” “It is the kind of marriage that may be either valid or invalid at the will of the families concerned. If it was to the advantage of the Albrets to consider it an ordinary morganatic marriage, they would condone Steinherz’s defiance, and probably induce the Emperor to confer a title of nobility on Félicia. Or if there was something really important at stake--for instance, if you took it into your head to revive your father’s claim to Thracia, and made yourself troublesome in the Balkans, and they found they must buy you off--they might even be brought to recognise the marriage as fully valid and regular, and declare Félicia a Princess of Arragon, just as a bribe to you to stay at home. It has been done, notably about two hundred years ago, in a case intimately connected with English history, but naturally, the consideration would have to be a large one. And on the other hand, if they see no advantage to them in the matter, they can deny the Pannonian marriage, and refuse to recognise the English one, and continue to give out officially that Prince Joseph was drowned off the Australian coast, however forcibly it may be proved to them that he wasn’t.” “I’m glad to hear you say this, for I still feel sometimes as if I was keeping Félicia out of something that was her due.”