I think I am not an unjust man, by nature; but some provocations would
make even the best tempers quick and squally. And, then, what is the
good of being an Archduke, if one may not flare out occasionally!
I was a bit lonely, too. The King was in the North and the Princess
was with him--and so, for a time, was Lotzen, I happened to know;
though I understood he had, now, left them and was returning to
Dornlitz. I wished him a long journey and a slow one.
His suave courtesy was becoming unbearable; and my sorest trial was to
receive it calmly and to meet it in kind. Truly, if he had found a
brilliant leading woman in Madeline Spencer, he had an equally
brilliant leading man in himself.
I was no possible match for him; and I could feel the sneer behind his
smile. I wanted to give him a good body beating--and I was sure he
knew it, and that it only amused him. I could, now, quite understand
the rage which makes a man walk up to another and smash him in the face
without a word of preliminary. I would have given five years of life
to do that to Lotzen.
And, instead, I had to smile--and smile--and smile. Bah! it makes me
shiver.
He must have fancied I wished him a long absence, for he returned with
astonishing promptness.
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