"Is it, dear?" she murmured, adorably sighing her contentment at this evidence that the night must yet be very young, indeed. And, finally, when moving stealthily like two happy thieves we went down into the cabin, she blew a kiss to the sleeping Thomas Jefferson Davis, then gave both hands impulsively to me, and disappeared into her room. After the door had closed, and I felt she would not open it again, I shook Tommy's shoulder. He blinked at me, mumbling: "Must have been asleep." "Must have been," I grinned down at him. And, when he saw my grin, he sat straight up and grinned back at me--for it is in this way that men sometimes understand each other. CHAPTER XXVII THE FINAL HOCUS-POCUS Doloria breakfasted in her room, but from the galley I sent a note on her tray, among other important things saying that I was about to break the news to Monsieur. In her reply, surreptitiously delivered by Echochee, who was smiling, she wrote--among still more important things--"for Heaven's sake, break it into tiny little pieces!" With this in mind, although having no idea how I should succeed, I came up by way of the fo'castle and walked aft to where Tommy and he were smoking. The open safe and three or four pipes belonging to Gates lay on the floor between them, while the old skipper who had taken the wheel was silently convulsed with laughter as he watched the puzzled expression on Monsieur's face and the innocence on Tommy's. My opportunity seeming favorable, I said: "Professor, last night the Princess decided to give up Azuria. She's promised to stay here and rule me; so I'm giving notice that neither you, nor any one else, can take her." He listened to this with more tolerance than surprise, giving Tommy a look that implied his distress to see my prostration taking the form of hallucinations. But Tommy added: "It's on the square. Jack's put one over, and all he asks is your blessing. Give it like a good sport, and, we'll drink their health." "You are cut-upping," he gasped, staring with wide eyes--that perceptibly narrowed as he glanced down at the pipes. "Call it what you please," Tommy imperturbably replied, though I knew that he was not at all sure of his ground, "but the Princess and Jack are going to be married, and I rather fancy I'm to be best man. It would be right decent of you, as the special emissary plenipotentiary extraordinary fat-and-hairy agent from Azuria, to give the bride away. I'm only suggesting it." But the professor was on his feet, sputtering and waving his arms in a torrent of rage. "It shall not be, it shall not be!" he cried. Then suddenly he began to laugh, looking at us with a superior air of cunning that made my flesh creep. "Why, you are as pigmies with your childish schemes! You suppose I have gone this far without arranging everything to circumvent you, or anything you could do? Bah!"