"Madame la princesse--if she will permit--commands my profound sympathy."

"But," she remembered, drying her eyes, "you called me an adventuress,
too!"

"But," he contended, gravely, "you had already called me the Lone Wolf."

"But what do you expect, monsieur, when I find you in my rooms--?"

"But what does madame la princesse expect when I find she had been to
mine--and brought something valuable away with her, too!"

"I had a reason--"

"So had I."

"What was it?"

"Perhaps it was to see madame la princesse alone--secretly--without
exciting the jealousy, which I understand is supernormal, of monsieur le
prince."

"But why should you wish to see me alone?" she demanded, with widening
eyes.

"Perhaps to beg madame's permission to offer her what may possibly prove
some slight consolation."

She weighed his words in dark distrust. What was this consolation? What his