"I have striven long and diligently to find you," I answered frankly, "because--because I wished to tell you how I love you--that I have loved you always--from the first moment that we met." A grave expression crossed her countenance. "And yet you forsook me! You calmly broke off the secret engagement that we had mutually made, and left me without a single word. You have married," she added resentfully, "therefore it is scarcely fitting that you should come here with a false declaration upon your lips." "It is no false declaration, I swear," I cried. "As for my wife, I knew her not, and she is now dead." "Dead!" she gasped. "You knew her not! I don't understand." "I have loved you always--always, Princess--for I have only ten minutes ago ascertained your true rank--" "Mabel to you--as always," she said, softly interrupting me. "Ah, thank you for those words!" I cried, taking her small gloved hand. "I have loved you from the first moment that we met at the colonel's, long ago--you remember that night?" "I shall never forget it," she faltered in that low tone as of old, which was as sweetest music to my ears. "And you remember that evening when I dined with you at The Boltons?" I said. "Incomprehensible though it may seem, I began a new life from that night, and for six whole years have existed in a state of utter unconsciousness of all the past. Will you consider me insane if I tell you that I have no knowledge whatever of meeting you after that night, and only knew of our engagement by discovering this letter among my private papers a couple of months ago?" and I drew her letter from my pocket. "Your words sound most remarkable," she said, deeply interested. "Relate the whole of the facts to me. But first come along to my own sitting-room. We may be interrupted here." And she led the way to the end of the corridor, where we entered an elegant little salon, one of the handsome suite of rooms she occupied. She drew forth a chair for me, and allowing a middle-aged gentlewoman-- her lady-in-waiting, I presume--to take her hat and gloves, we once more found ourselves alone. How exquisitely beautiful she was! Yet her royal birth, alas! placed her beyond my reach. All my hopes and aspirations had been in an instant crushed by the knowledge of her rank. I could only now relate to her the truth, and seek her forgiveness for what had seemed a cruel injustice. I took her unresisting hand, and told her how long ago I had loved her, not daring to expose to her the great secret of my heart. If we had mutually decided upon marriage, and I had deliberately deserted her, it was, I declared, because of that remarkable unconsciousness which had blotted out all knowledge of my life previous to that last night when we had dined together, and I had accompanied the man Hickman to his lodgings. "But tell me all," she urged, "so that I can understand and judge accordingly."