He had been a Minister of the Crown for a short term of office, and by the time they reached his sitting-room, and he had locked the door, after the wine had been placed on the table, diplomacy had come to his aid, and he had made up his mind. When he had filled the glasses he took out his cigar-case, selected the best it contained, and said: "Prince, I'm going to ask you to allow me to take a very great liberty." "My dear Lord Orrel, there is nothing that you could do that I should consider a liberty. Thank you, I will; I know that your cigars are always most excellent, and now we will make ourselves comfortable, and you shall take your liberty." He took the proffered cigar as he spoke, snipped the end, and lit it. Lord Orrel did the same, and when they had saluted each other over their wine, in the old-fashioned, courtly style, he began: "My dear prince, the liberty that I am going to ask your permission to take is a very great one, because it is a liberty of anticipation; and few men, even the most chivalrous, care to be anticipated, especially when they have an interesting story to tell. In other words, I, too, have a very strange story to tell you. In fact, the strangest that ever came within my experience. And there are reasons, which I will explain to you afterwards, why I am asking the favour of your permission to tell it before yours." The prince looked puzzled, and his dark brows approached each other for just the fraction of a second. He took a sip at his wine, leant back in his chair, and blew a long whiff of smoke up towards the gaudily-painted ceiling. Then he said, with a barely perceptible shrug of his shoulders: "My dear Lord Orrel, you are not asking me any favour. On the contrary, you are merely requesting that you shall entertain me before I try to do the same by you. Moreover, as it is quite impossible that there can be any connection between our stories, there can be no question of anticipation; so, pray, proceed. I am all attention." "As I said," began Lord Orrel, settling himself in his chair, and taking a long pull at his cigar, "the story is a very strange one, and it is also one which could not well be told from the housetops, because it involves--well, what may be something almost as wonderful as what you hinted at in the garden just now." "Ah," interrupted the prince, with a visible start and a sudden lifting of the eyebrows, "then, in truth, it must be strange indeed; and so I am more than ever anxious to hear it; and if, as I divine, you wish me to treat it in confidence, you, of course, have my word, as a gentleman of France, that no detail of it shall ever pass my lips." His host felt not a little relieved at being released from the necessity of binding him to secrecy, as, for the sake of his colleagues, he would have felt obliged to do; so he said: "That, my dear prince, it would be quite impossible to imagine; and now, as it is getting a little late, I will get to my story."