“Very much, I’m sure.  I suppose you’d call Neenah a rare gem?”

“She is certainly not an old painting.”

“How old is she, pray?”

“Seventeen—­by no means an antique.  Speaking of princesses and ogres, has it occurred to you that you would bring a fortune in the market?”

“Mr. Chase!”

“You know, it’s barely possible that you may be put in a matrimonial shop window if Von Blitz and his friends should capture you alive.  Ever think of that?”

“Good heavens!  You—­why, what a horrible thing to say!”

“You won’t bring as much in the South Sea market as you would in Rapp-Thorberg or Paris, but I daresay you could be sold for—­”

“Please, Mr. Chase, don’t suggest anything so atrocious,” she cried, something like terror in her voice.

“Neenah’s father sold her for a handful of gems,” said he, with distinct meaning in his voice.  She was silent, and he went on after a moment.  “Is there so much difference, after all, where one is sold, just so long as the price is satisfactory to all concerned?”

“You are very unkind, Mr. Chase,” she said with quiet dignity.  “I do not deserve your sarcasm.”

“I humbly plead for forgiveness,” he said, suddenly contrite.  “It was beastly.”

“American wit, I imagine you call it,” she said scornfully.  “I don’t care to talk with you any longer.”

“Won’t you forgive me?  I’m a poor brute—­don’t lash me.  In two or three weeks I’ll step down and out of your life; that will be penalty enough, don’t you think?”

“For whom?” she asked in a voice so low that he could scarcely hear the words.  Then she laughed ironically.  “I do forgive.  It is all that a prince or a princess is ever asked to do, I’m beginning to believe.  I also forgive you for coming into my life.”

“If I had been a trifle more intelligent, I should not have come into it at all,” he said.  She turned upon him quickly, stung by the remark.

“Is that the way you feel about it?” she asked sharply.

“You don’t understand.  A man of intelligence would never have kicked Prince Karl.  As a matter of fact, in trying to kick Prince Karl out of your life, I kicked myself into it.  A very simple process, and yet scarcely intellectual.  A jackass could have done as much.”

“A jackass may kick at a king,” she paraphrased casually.  “A cat may only look at him.  But let us go back to realities.  Do you mean to tell me that they—­these wretches—­would dare to sell me—­us, I mean—­into the kind of slavery you mention?” A trace of anxiety deepened the tone of her voice.  She was now keenly alert and no longer trivial.