“Dear Man, the Prince vanishes, not because he wishes it, but because he must.  He can’t explain.  But, though you may not understand now, believe this.  He has been happier in these wanderings, since you and he were friends, than he ever was before.  You have been more than good to the troublesome ‘Brat’ who has upset all your arrangements and calculations so often.  Perhaps you may never see the Boy any more.  Yet, who knows what may happen at Monte Carlo?  Anyhow, whatever comes in the future, he will never forget, never cease to care for you; and of one thing besides he is sure.  Never again will he like any other man as much as the One Man who deserves to begin with a capital.

“Good-bye, dear Man, and all good things be with you, wherever you may go, is the prayer of—­Boy.”

Perhaps never to see the Boy again!  Why, I must be dreaming this.  I should wake up soon, and everything would be as it had been.  I had the sensation of having swallowed something very large and very cold, which would not melt.  Reading the letter over for the second time made it no better, but rather worse.  The Boy had become almost as important in my scheme of life as my lungs or my legs, and I did not quite see, at the moment, how it would be any more possible to get on without one than the other.

Behold, I was stricken down by mine own familiar friend; yet no wrath against him burned within me; there was only that cold lump of disappointment, which seemed to be increasing to the size of a small iceberg.  Even lacking explanations, or attempt at them, I knew that he had told the truth without flattery.  He had wanted to stay, yet he had gone.  And he said that perhaps I might never see him again!  If I could have had my choice last night, whether to have the Boy lopped off my life, or to lose a hand, the probabilities are that I would have sacrificed the hand.  But I had been offered no choice.

I recalled our parting, and found new meaning in the words he had spoken at his door.  There was no doubt about it; even then he had decided to break away from me.

I realised this, and at the same instant rebelled against the decision.  I determined not to accept it.  He had vanished because of the two Americans; exactly why, I could not even guess, but I was certain that the reason was not to his discredit.  To theirs, perhaps, but not to his.  Nevertheless, they were somehow to blame for my loss, and if the young men had appeared at this moment, I should have been impelled to do them a mischief.

The principal thing was, however, not to let them cheat me irrevocably of my comrade.  I would not depend solely upon that hint about Monte Carlo.  I would find out where he had gone, and I would follow.  Let him be angry if he would.  His anger, though a hot flame while it burned, never endured long.

“Did Monsieur leave here by rail?” I enquired of Innocentina.

She shrugged her shoulders.  “That I cannot tell.”